Campaigners call for action over UK’s ‘shameful’ lung health

The UK has the highest death rate for lung conditions in western Europe, research reveals, prompting calls from health leaders for urgent action to tackle the “national scandal”.

More than 100,000 people in the UK die from conditions including asthma attacks, bronchitis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and pneumonia every year, according to data analysis by the charity Asthma and Lung UK.

Across Europe, only Turkey has a higher respiratory death rate than the UK, analysis of data up to 2018 shows.

It described the UK figures as “shameful”, and said that lung conditions had for too long been treated like the “poor relation compared with other major illnesses like cancer and heart disease”.

Even before the pandemic, significant numbers of lung patients were not receiving “basic care” from their GP services such as medicine checks and help using their inhalers, the charity said. Over the past two years, the health of thousands more has deteriorated while they waited for respiratory care, and diagnosis rates have fallen.

Katy Brown, 64, a retired nursery nurse from Bristol, who was diagnosed with COPD in February 2021, said she was shocked by the lack of medical support she has received, and the poor general awareness of her condition.

“I spent two years struggling to breathe and with constant chest infections, before I finally got a diagnosis of COPD,” she said. “Even now, over a year after my diagnosis, I’m still waiting for a test that will show how bad my condition is, and further treatment.

“There is a lack of awareness about how serious lung conditions are and how terrifying it is to struggle to breathe. It’s like having an elephant sitting on your chest. If I’d been diagnosed with another serious condition like a heart problem, I believe my treatment and the way I was dealt with would have been completely different.”

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Source: The Guardian, 28 February 2022