A new study has provided further confirmation of a link between exposure to paracetamol and the risk of developing asthma in childhood. Published in the International Journal of Epidemiology, the analysis found that taking paracetamol during pregnancy, or administering it to babies during infancy, is associated with the child developing asthma a few years later. Providing clear evidence of the dangers of paracetamol, the researchers were also able to specifically eliminate the possibility that the asthma cases recorded were instead caused by the medical problem the drug was taken for.
Carried out by researchers from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, the University of Oslo and the University of Bristol in the UK, the study examined health data on 114,761 children born in Norway between 1999 and 2008. The results show that infant exposure to paracetamol increases the risk of developing asthma by 29%, with exposure during pregnancy resulting in a 13% increase.
One of the most common chronic diseases, around 235 million people worldwide are estimated to suffer from asthma. Deaths from the condition are believed to reach up to 180,000 globally per year. Given the widespread global use of paracetamol it is clearly possible that a significant proportion of these cases may have resulted from prenatal or infant exposure to the drug. As such, with the disease having become a huge financial burden on our healthcare systems these days, and no orthodox cure anywhere in sight, millions of asthma sufferers worldwide are understandably seeking alternative ways to improve their asthma symptoms safely and effectively.
Significantly, therefore, researchers at the Dr. Rath Research Institute have conducted a pilot clinical trial in asthma patients aged between 45 and 75 years old. The patients took a synergistically designed combination of micronutrients for a period of three months and, during the study, were intermittently subjected to lung function tests. At the end of the study all of the patients were found to have an increased lung capacity. Particularly impressively, many of them recorded almost double the lung capacity compared to their values at the start of the trial. Through the targeted use of micronutrients, it is therefore clear that the Cellular Medicine approach opens up the real possibility of an effective means for controlling asthma.
Meanwhile, as we reported last year, a scientific review has looked at the risks of taking paracetamol on a long-term basis and concluded that its dangers are seemingly being underestimated even by clinicians. Published online in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases journal, researchers from the UK examined eight studies assessing the association between chronic use of the painkiller and major adverse events. Contrary to the general impression given by the pharma industry and its stakeholders that paracetamol is a safe “cure-all” drug, the researchers discovered that long term use of it raises the risk of heart attacks, strokes, high blood pressure, renal failure, gastrointestinal bleeding and early death. With shocking long-term risks such as these, and even short-term use prenatally or in infancy now found to be unsafe, evidence is mounting that paracetamol is arguably one of the most dangerous over-the-counter drugs available.