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Parents should do their best to keep their children away from air pollution and family problems to protect them from strong chances of suffering from asthma.
Recent studies have shown that children constantly exposed to air pollution and family stress makes them susceptible to asthma.
Based on the study conducted by the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC) it was learned that the risk of asthma associated with traffic-related pollution was significantly higher for children of parents reporting high levels of stress. Stress, as well as low parental education, was also associated with larger effects of
exposure to tobacco smoke during pregnancy.
Principal investigator Rob McConnell, M.D., professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC and Deputy Director of the Children’s Environmental Health Center at USC revealed they found out that it was the children who were exposed to the combination of air pollution and life in a stressful environment who were at highest risk of developing asthma.
It was learned that asthma is the most common chronic childhood illness in developed countries and has been linked to environmental factors.
The study drew upon data from the USC Children’s Health Study, a longitudinal study of respiratory health among children in 13 southern California communities.
To get the data, researchers followed 2,497 children with no history of respiratory problems over three years, tracking whether they developed asthma starting in kindergarten or first grade.
The researchers also measured parental stress and parental education as an indicator of socioeconomic status using a questionnaire, and collected information on exposure to traffic-related pollution and whether the children had been exposed to tobacco smoke in utero.

Children should keep away from air pollution and family stress to avoid getting inflicted with asthma.

It was learned in the study that the results showed that parental stress alone did not increase the risk that children would develop asthma.
However, when children had a combination of parents with stressful lives and also lived near high levels of traffic-related pollution, their risk of asthma increased compared with children only exposed to pollution.
McConnell explained air pollution can promote inflammatory responses in the airways of the lung, which is a central feature of asthma.
McConnell added stress may also have pro-inflammatory effects and this may help explain why the two exposures together were important.
Moreover, McConnell said children whose parents perceived their lives as unpredictable, uncontrollable, or overwhelming were susceptible to the effects of pollution.
He said stress associated with poverty may help explain why asthma rates are often higher in lower socioeconomic status communities.
He added childhood asthma is a complex disease that probably has many contributing causes.
The medical expert said further study of effects of exposure to air pollution in combination with stressful environments associated with poverty and other social factors could contribute to our understanding of why the disease develops.