Arthur Cano
Newspaper La Jornada
Wednesday, April 27, 2022, p. fifteen
Eight million Mexicans suffer the most common chronic airway disease
: asthma, which affects people of all ages, is often confused with other diseases and is incurable, although fully treatable
.
On the eve of World Asthma Day (May 3), experts convened by the pharmaceutical company Sanofi offered a press conference on the myths
around this disease suffered by one in 10 people in the world.
Said Arablin Oropeza, a clinical immunologist, explained that most patients are well controlled with inhaled medications, as long as it’s the correct dosage and obvious measures, such as quitting smoking.
Control of the disease allows a normal life, despite its chronic nature, although there is no single treatment.
The specialist explained that an uncontrolled patient would be one who presents daytime symptoms more than twice a week. A separate segment is represented by between 5 and 10 percent of patients with severe asthma who do not respond to common treatments. In these cases, the disease can lead to death (6.5 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants occur in the world, according to 2017 figures).
Immunologist Ana del Carmen García explained that asthma can appear at any stage of life, despite the fact that there are myths that a child will outgrow it when they reach adolescence.
There are many ghosts that can confuse us
explained the specialist, so an accurate diagnosis is necessary to provide adequate treatment for this disease that, in Mexico, it is a public health problem
.
Lirio Solano, an expert pediatrician at the pharmaceutical company, indicated that it is necessary increase understanding of the impact of severe uncontrolled asthma
for which Sanofis already has treatments.
Sanofi is one of the five big pharma (with Pfizer, Roche, Johnson & Johnson, Merck and Novartis) that multiplied their profits with the pandemic. In Mexico, Sanofi ranked first among its competitors in 2020, with sales of 14 billion pesos.
