On World Asthma Day, doctors call for urgent school-based asthma care systems

On World Asthma Day, Dr Puneet Aulakh Pooni, Honorary Executive Member of the Ludhiana Forum, Doctors for Clean Air and Climate Action, has warned that Punjab is facing a paediatric emergency as thousands of children suffer undiagnosed asthma, often struggling through classrooms and playgrounds without treatment or support.

Dr Pooni, who is working as a professor and head of Paediatrics and Director of Paediatric Critical Care Fellowship programme at Dayanand Medical College and Hospital (DMCH), said schools must become the frontline in tackling the crisis.

“Every school should know how to handle an asthma attack, and every child with symptoms should be guided toward diagnosis and care,” she stressed, calling for mandatory asthma management policies across educational institutions.

Recent comparative research by the Lung Care Foundation and PURE Foundation revealed that nearly one in three adolescents in Delhi (29.4 per cent) showed airflow obstruction, a figure likely mirrored in Punjab’s polluted environments. Even more worrying, 88 per cent of children identified as asthmatic were unaware of their condition and only 3 per cent were using inhalers.

“This is not poor awareness, it is a dangerous failure of the system,” Dr Pooni said. “We are raising a generation that believes breathlessness is normal, however, it is not.”

“Children are coughing daily, waking up breathless at night, and avoiding sports. Without school-based intervention, many will continue to suffer silently,” she noted.

Punjab’s growing pollution burden from traffic emissions, industrial activity, construction dust, and seasonal spikes has pushed air quality far beyond safe limits. But Dr Pooni warned that indoor exposures are equally dangerous: cigarette smoke, incense sticks, mosquito coils, dampness, mould, and poorly ventilated cooking fumes can all trigger repeated attacks.

“Fine particulate matter penetrates deep into developing lungs, steadily worsening asthma severity,” he explained. “This is no longer an environmental issue alone, it is a paediatric emergency,” she said.

Dr Pooni highlighted that many families still believe inhalers are addictive or unsafe. This misinformation delays treatment and pushes children toward repeated antibiotics, cough syrups, and hospital visits. “The truth is simple: inhalers prevent attacks, protect lung function, and allow children to live normal, active lives,” she said.

While Delhi’s data offers a warning, Dr Pooni urged Punjab to conduct its own large-scale respiratory research to map the burden and plan targeted interventions. “WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros has said, ‘There is little time to waste.’ For Punjab, these words are not global they are local truth,” she cautioned.

Recommendations for schools by Dr Pooni

• Training teachers to recognize asthma symptoms and respond to attacks.
• Emergency response protocols in classrooms and playgrounds.
• Routine screening through spirometry and symptom-based checks integrated into school health programs.
• Awareness drives to dispel myths about inhalers, which remain the safest and most effective foundation of asthma control.