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Wildfires affect children with or without asthma

Respiratory Care Weekly, December 27, 2006

California's 2003 wildfires affected children's respiratory health whether they had asthma or not, according to the December 1 American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. Interestingly, symptoms such as throat and nose irritation and eye problems actually occurred more frequently in non-asthmatic children than those with asthma.

"Children with asthma were more likely to take preventive action, such as wearing masks or staying indoors during the fire," says Nino Künzli, MD, PhD, associate professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. "It appears that taking preventive action might indeed have reduced the health problems."

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