The prevalence of asthma varies widely throughout the world. We now believe that asthma is due to airway inflammation caused by an imbalance of the T-lymphocytes in the airway. The atopy that drives asthma is due to a predominance of Th2 lymphocytes in the airway. This paper links the prevalence of asthma inversely to the prevalence of tuberculosis and enteric infection. We will argue that the reason we observe such marked variations in the prevalence of asthma around the world is the fact that in the developing world there is a survival advantage in the fetal immune response to mature from Th2 to Th1 lymphocyte predominant. A Th1 response is required to combat infectious diseases such as typhoid and tuberculosis. Data from the World Health Organization confirms that these two infectious diseases occur very rarely in those communities where the asthma is high. It may be that the clean and infection-free environment of Australia and New Zealand is responsible for the region of Oceania having the dubious honor of having the highest prevalence of asthma in the world.
The prevalence of asthma appears to be inversely related to the incidence of typhoid and tuberculosis: hypothesis to explain the variation in asthma prevalence around the world
천식의 유병률은 장티푸스와 결핵의 발생률과 반비례하는 것으로 보인다: 전 세계적으로 천식 유병률의 변화를 설명하기 위한 가설
[Category] 살모넬라증,
[Article Type] journal-article
[Source] pubmed
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