Pediatric Asthma in Southern Africa

Pediatric asthma has been well researched and actively managed in Southern Africa for many years. From the earliest study of asthma prevalence in 1979 revealing a significant rural - urban asthma gradient to more recent studies suggesting that asthma now abounds in all population and socio-economic groups, Southern Africa has been the subject of a significant number of publications relating to asthma prevalence, etiologies or associations and treatment guidelines. Asthma is now present in 20% of school-children across Southern Africa, but may not have the same etiological factors commonly seen in the West. Southern Africa has areas with a high asthma prevalence, areas with amongst the highest mortality in the world and similar problems to first-world countries with regard to morbidity and cost of disease. Guide- lines for asthma management published from South Africa highlight the importance of aiming for complete asthma con- trol and avoiding morbidity, exacerbations and mortality.