Which aspect of urban living is responsible for increased asthma rates?
A number of factors can be attributed to elevated rates of asthma among urbanites. These include, but are not limited to “passive smoking, outdoor pollutants, substandard housing, increased time indoors, poor diet, decreased access to health care, and exposure to cockroaches.” 5Even though the precise cause is currently unknown, urban living itself, as an independent factor, rather than race, seems to coincide with asthma being “a disease of modern civilization.” 6 Furthermore, asthma rates among black Africans are very low, and when it does occur, it is attributed to urbanization/industrialization. Other evidence shows that individuals from countries such as India and Malaysia-countries with low levels of asthma-who immigrate to countries with a high incidence of asthma, such as England or Australia, seem to, within a few decades, develop asthma rates similar to the country to which they immigrated, again pointing to asthma as a “consequence of exposure to a modern, urban environment.
