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November is COPD awareness month. COPD, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is a name for several disorders characterized by persistent or recurring obstruction of airflow, particularly chronic bronchitis and emphysema. • Causes:
An article
on MedicineNet.com states that smoking is the cause
of 90% of COPD cases in the United States, and
that 15% of smokers will develop COPD. The 2004
document The
Health Consequences of Smoking: A Report of the
Surgeon General states that female smokers
were nearly 13 times as likely to die from COPD
as women who had never smoked, and that male smokers
were nearly 12 times as likely to die from COPD
as men who had never smoked. Other causes of COPD include indoor and outdoor air pollution, occupational dusts and chemicals, frequent lung infections in childhood, and the rare genetic condition alpha-1 antitrypsin, or AAT deficiency. • The United
States: The CDC's fastfacts
information on COPD show that for 2005, there were
8.9 million noninstitutionalized adults with diagnosed
chronic bronchitis in the past year (representing
4.1% of the population) and 3.8 million noninstitutionalized
adults who have ever been diagnosed with emphysema
(representing 1.7% of the population). Together,
this amounts to more than 12 million people –
and this doesn't include those who haven't been
diagnosed, who are estimated
to be another 12 million. Year 2000 numbers show
that 71,900 home health patients had COPD as their
primary diagnosis, while numbers for 2004 show
that there were 123,884 deaths resulting from COPD,
representing 42.2 deaths per 100,000 population,
and making COPD the fourth leading cause of death
in the USA.
• Canada:
The Canadian Lung Association's 2005 COPD
national report card states that COPD is
the fourth leading cause of death among Canadians,
and that there are approximately 714,000 Canadians
diagnosed with the condition, who represent 2.3%
of the population. However, the report stated that
the condition is vastly under-diagnosed and under-reported
in Canada, and there are an estimated 50% more
individuals who remain undiagnosed. The report
also stated that only 45% of Canadians had heard
of "chronic obstructive pulmonary disease," and
only 17% had heard of "COPD."
• Worldwide:
The World Health Organization estimates
that 80 million people have moderate to severe
COPD and 3 million people died of COPD in 2005,
which corresponds to 5% of all deaths globally
in that year. COPD was the fifth leading cause
of death worldwide in 2002, and estimates show
that it will move up to being the fourth leading
cause of death in 2030.
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