Asthma has been rising steadily for the past half-century. The study published in the July online issue of 'The Journal of Infectious Diseases' found that Helicobacter pylori, a bacterium that has co-existed with humans for at least 50,000 years, may lead to peptic ulcers and stomach cancer.
However, kids between the ages of 3 and 13 are nearly 59 percent less likely to have asthma if they carry the bug, according to the study among more than 7,000 subjects led by New York University School of Medicine.
In effect, the long-time microbial inhabitant of the human stomach may protect children from developing the disease.
"Our findings suggest that absence of H. Pylori may be one explanation for the increased risk of childhood asthma," says Yu Chen, assistant professor of epidemiology at University.
"Among teens and children ages 3 to 19 years, carriers of H Pylori were 25 percent less likely to have asthma," said Chen, the co-author of the study.
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These results are based on an analysis of data gathered from 7,412 participants in the fourth National Health and Nutrition Survey (NHANES IV) conducted from 1999 to 2000 by the National Center for Health Statistics, the Science Daily online said.
H Pylori, once nearly universal in humans, has been slowly disappearing from developed countries over the past century due to increased antibiotic use, which kills off the bacteria, and cleaner water and homes.