Poor Kids Have Worse Asthma?
Well.
An initial read of this headline prompted me to say, “Well, yeah. Of course poverty makes childhood asthma worse.” Limited housing options, the stress of not having enough healthy food or access to good medical care, urban schools in high-traffic areas–how could these factors associated with poverty not add up to worse asthma? And the link between asthma and poverty is already fairly well established, if not yet clearly defined.
If you go read the article, though, you’ll see this study is more complex than that because it suggests a poor lifestyle somehow changes children’s genes, making them produce more inflammatory cytokines. Kids from more affluent backgrounds, on the other hand, had higher levels of genes that control the inflammatory response.
The question is why? but there’s no answer yet. The final sentence in this HealthDay article, via the American Lung Association, offers a small clue:
[Researchers] also suggested that negative perceptions of a person’s surroundings may alter biological mechanisms in the body.
If the Ethical Argument for Healthier Air Quality Doesn’t Sway People, Maybe the Financial One Will
Let’s face it. No one actually cares about asthma except doctors, patients, or parents of asthma kids like me. However, L.A. County is losing $12 billion every year because of health problems (asthma hospitalizations, for example) related to air pollution, and maybe that enormous cost will prompt more action.
Have You Heard About Google Flu Yet?
Other websites track flu trends during the sick seasons but since it’s Google, I’d bookmark this one.
German Doctors Appear to Have Cured AIDS in One Patient
Doctors performed a very high-risk stem cell transplant on a patient with both AIDS and leukemia, and the procedure involves cells from a donor with a natural resistance to H.I.V. Twenty months later, the patient still shows no signs of the virus and is not taking antiretroviral drugs. While stem cell transplants like this aren’t feasible on a wide scale, apparently the results indicate more hope for AIDS’ researchers’ more practical goal of treating AIDS with injections of resistant stem cells.
Edited for one more, 10 AM:
Allie’s Giving Away More Eco Stuff
Leave a comment on Allie’s excellent blog to win a free Weleda Sea Buckthorn Creamy Body Wash, which apparently smells like a creamsicle. While you’re there, read all the way through to the end to check out her friend Neil’s fundraiser for the Cambodia Children’s Fund. Good luck!
Thanks for the link.
The idea of poverty causing genetic changes is just devastating. I can’t get over that.