Childhood asthma is less common in neighbourhoods with high economic potential and strong community vitality.
Childhood asthma is less common in neighbourhoods with high economic potential and strong community vitality.
While the role of economic and environmental factors in childhood asthma has been studied extensively, there has been very little investigation on how social factors might influence the prevalence of the disease.
To explore whether community and neighbourhood characteristics influence the prevalence of childhood asthma, researchers analysed asthma screening surveys of 45,177 children attending Chicago public schools, between 2003 and 2005, and then mapped all the children into 287 different neighbourhoods. They ranked the neighbourhoods in four groups based on asthma cases.
It was found that neighbourhoods with low asthma prevalence had higher scores on the Community Vitality Index, which combines ratings for social capital, economic potential, and community amenities. They also had higher economic potential.
The strongest factor, which remained after the researchers adjusted for the racial makeup of the neighbourhoods, was social capital, which measures the degree of civic engagement among residents along with other factors.
The above findings indicate that policy changes at the community level could help reduce asthma prevalence.
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