Asthma and Allergies in Childhood Survey (ISACC) in the Northeastern Mexico Border Region

摘要

This research addresses key issues related to air quality - health effects interactions by applying ISAAC (International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood) survey to the Mexican border cities. This research focuses mainly on children's health because children are more vulnerable and susceptible to environmental risk, and because is possible to monitor and improve the environmental and health conditions, and also help to track and inform on progress resulting of health policy. The research involves 4 steps: (1) selection of the elementary and high school student population by selecting schools within a given geographical area. The sampling will be focus on two ages group (13 - 14 years old; and 6 -7 year olds); (2) gathering data, involves the collection of data from primary and secondary sources for economic, social, health and environment factors, and also information from transport and other sectors; (3) applying survey, and (4) analysis of the survey outcome. The prevalence of respiratory diseases such as: asthma, rhinitis and eczema, were estimated from the survey results. The prevalence of asthma were 7.1, 4.5 and 6.9 for Nuevo Laredo, Reynosa and Matamoros respectively. The results of ISAAC survey provide an indication of how public perceives the issues of respiratory diseases and provides recommendations derived from the experience of applying the ISAAC survey on the Mexican side of the border.