(Heres our investigationinto how asthma might affect the risk of experiencing severe complications from COVID-19.)
TheCDCsays around 25 million Americans live with asthmathats 7.7 percent of adults and 7.5 percent of kids.
I study the social determinants, and the main thing is place.
Getty / Nadia Bormotova / Morgan Johnson
Where you liveyour zip codeis a better predictor of your health outcomes than your genetics.
Its not one-size-fits-all, because everyone affected with asthma will need something slightly different.
The best path (or paths) forward depends on the ultimate desired outcome.
Here are a few places to start.
We need increased access to long-term, preventive asthma care.
Plentyofresearchhas shown that many black and Hispanic children and adults with asthmarely more on emergency care than preventive care.
Reasons for this include lack of access to primary care providers, language barriers, and lack of insurance.
More discussion and support may be needed to help people stick to the necessary routine.
However, due to a nationalshortage of primary care physicians, access to their services is in high demand.
We need better community support for people with asthma.
There needs to be some education around how asthma is controlled, Goodman says.
People need to know how to use the inhaler.
What you’re free to do in your own home that can decrease asthma triggers?
What about out in the environment?
How do you control your own asthma?
Plus, he notes, many people are uninsured or underinsured, necessitating further Medicaid expansion.
We need to think holistically and address medical and social factors, Dr. Chin tells SELF.
We need environmental justice solutions.
They have a larger burden of all of those things, she says.
Obviously, most people just cant pick up and move, Dr. Volerman Beaser says.
But more systemically, it takes advocacy among all of us.
How can we improve the environment?
How can we control where factories are built?
Tracking [emissions], advocating for limits on older cars, those pieces can go a long way.
A lot of them fall on national and state policy.
That brings us to our final point.
We need more community advocacy.
Any individual person has two hats, Dr. Chin explains.
The second hat is being a citizen and an advocate.
you might advocate for regulations that lead to clean air, Dr. Chin says.
While those goals are huge, they are not impossible to achieve.
