Prevalence of Asthma in People in Their 20s Grew Seven-fold to 5% in Ten Years

According to a study, 20-somethings are experiencing a rapid rise in asthma, which typically affects older adults in their 60s and 70s.

The Department of Pulmonology at Asan Medical Center (AMC)’s Oh Yeon-mok, Lee Se-won, and Lee Jae-seung Lee looked at data from 92,000 people from the National Health and Nutrition Survey from 2007 to 2018 to see how asthma prevalence changed by age group.

They discovered that the prevalence of asthma among 20-somethings rose from 0.7% in 2007 to 5.1% in 2018.

In addition, the 20s had the highest asthma prevalence of any age group, compared to 4.6% in the 70s and 3.8% in the 60s, which were the age groups most at risk for asthma in the past. The lowest rate, along with that of 30-somethings, was 0.7% among 20-somethings with asthma in 2007.

What’s more, albeit the reason for asthma has not been unequivocally distinguished, studies have shown that hypersensitive rhinitis and atopic dermatitis are connected with the improvement of asthma. However, the new study demonstrated a strong correlation between the prevalence of asthma among Koreans in their 20s and the recent rise in allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis.

For instance, the incidence of allergic rhinitis in 20-somethings increased significantly from 17.2% in 2007 to 23.51% in 2018, and the incidence of atopic dermatitis also significantly increased from 5.9% to 11.7%.

During the course of the study, allergic rhinitis affected 44.6 percent of asthmatics in their 20s, compared to 20.6% of people without asthma. Atopic dermatitis affected 25.3 percent of asthmatics in their 20s, compared to 8% of people without asthma.

A multivariate analysis was also carried out by the team to ascertain the connection between asthmatic patients in their 20s who had allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis and known asthma risk factors like gender, income, education, smoking history, exposure to secondhand smoke, and obesity.

Only allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis were statistically associated, according to the findings.

“Although reasons for the increase in the proportion of asthma patients in their 20s in Korea are not yet clear, the recent increase in asthma patients in their 20s seems to be related to allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis,” Professor Oh said. “We will continue paying attention and researching the causes.”

The results were recently published in the Journal of Thoracic Disease.