'Congestion tax' linked to nearly 50% drop in asthma rates among children

When Stockholm, Sweden, introduced a "congestion tax" to discourage driving in the center of town, traffic eased and the pollution level dropped by between 5 and 10 percent.
One other result was less expected but no less welcome: The rate of asthma attacks among local children decreased by nearly 50 percent, according to a Johns Hopkins Business School economist's study of the tax and its impact.
The health improvement in the children appeared more gradually than the observed decline in the pollution level. This suggests that the full health benefits from reduced pollution might not occur immediately, says Emilia Simeonova, an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School.....

Read more here: news-medical.net

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Hope for millions of asthma sufferers as new pill could prevent all serious attacks
Researchers at Leicester University have identified a protein which triggers the narrowing of airways which cause the potentially fatal lung condition

A new asthma pill that prevents severe attacks could be on the horizon after a breakthrough by British scientists.
Researchers at Leicester University have identified a protein which triggers the narrowing of airways which cause the potentially fatal lung condition.
The believe a new treatment could be available within five years.
Asthma affects 4.3 million adults and 1.1 million children in Britain. An attack kills three people every day.
The team said improved therapies are a "step closer" after they identified for the first time that severe sufferers have increased levels of a key protein HMGB1 which leads to airways constricting.....

Read more here: mirror.co.uk

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Racial gap in children's asthma linked to social inequality
Study looked at 12,000-plus children in Houston

African-American and poor children in the United States suffer disproportionately from asthma. But according to a new study from sociologists at Rice University, racial and socio-economic gaps in the proportion of children in Houston who have asthma may be a result of social inequalities in the neighborhoods where children live.
"Comprehensive Neighborhood Portraits and Child Asthma Disparities" will appear in an upcoming edition of the Maternal and Child Health Journal. In the study, the researchers found that of the 12,000+ children in Houston who have asthma, the chronic disease of airways in the lungs is more prevalent among African-American children than white children and occurs most often among African-American children living in poor neighborhoods. The researchers also found that children of all races and ethnicities, including white children, have a greater risk of developing asthma when they live in poor neighborhoods, compared with children living in middle-class or affluent neighborhoods.....

Read more here: sciencedaily.com