Stevenson Backs Motion Highlighting Asthma Concerns

Banff and Buchan MSP Stewart Stevenson has supported a Parliamentary motion highlighting the concerns that Scotland has the world’s highest incidence of asthma in children, as revealed by the Global Initiative for Asthma.

Commenting on the issue, Mr Stevenson said:

“It does not make for good reading to learn that the children of Scotland have the highest occurrence of asthma in the world. As well as this being bad news health wise, it is also bad news financially for Scotland.

“Research carried out by the National Asthma Campiagn Scotland suggests that approximately, asthma costs Scotland £194.9 million per year and that 3.5 million asthma sufferers in the UK say that traffic pollution aggravates their concdition. The pollution factor is most definitely an area which requires further research in order to reduce the number of those which suffer from asthma.

“More must be done in the area of finding the cause of asthma instead of simply treating the symptoms it produces. The Scottish Executive need to explore this area in order to ascertain why Scotland continues to have such high rates of asthma and therefore what action can be taken to reduce this trend.”