Page 737 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 1 May 2007
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and links with health and education sectors, parent representative groups and asthma foundations.
The launch today occurred at Fraser primary school, as it is the 70th school in the ACT to become accredited. Congratulations to Fraser primary and to the 69 other asthma-friendly schools in Canberra. Today the Asthma Foundation of the ACT also becomes a full member of Asthma Foundations Australia and launches its new website. All members can look at that at asthmaact.org.au.
On the national scale, more than two million Australians suffer from asthma. But a report released today by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare shows that the rate has thankfully fallen from 11.6 per cent in 2001 to 10.3 per cent in 2005-06. This is welcome news. The report found the rate of asthma in the ACT did not differ significantly from the national average. Sadly, however, children with asthma continue to be exposed to one of the key risk factors for asthma—smoking, particularly in the home. The report has found that more than one in 10 children with asthma have parents who smoke at home, despite warnings that it can make their condition worse.
Today is a timely reminder to all of us of the dangers of exposing children to passive smoke. Efforts of our health system and organisations such as the ACT Asthma Foundation are helping to reduce the prevalence of asthma. But World Asthma Day reminds us all that we must be vigilant to ensure that young lungs are not exposed to risk factors such as passive smoking.
MS MacDONALD: Mr Speaker, I have a supplementary question. Minister, could you please provide details on measures being undertaken by the ACT government to reduce the prevalence of asthma?
MS GALLAGHER: The ACT government offers a wide selection of programs to support people living with asthma and to reduce the prevalence of asthma in the community.
The child, youth and women’s health program in ACT Health runs the community asthma support service. This service employs asthma educators to provide education sessions for children and young people up to 25 in the community. Asthma educators from this service conduct home visits to educate children and young people about their asthma equipment and medication. Asthma educators also educate staff in childcare centres and preschools, and childcare students at CIT, and visit schools to provide education to teachers.
The emergency departments at both our public hospitals and GPs are supplied with community asthma support service packages to distribute to clients with asthma. The service also receives referrals from hospitals and the GPs. The Canberra Hospital also employs an adult asthma educator, who provides asthma education services to adult inpatients at TCH and outpatients across the ACT. Due to the strong links between smoking and asthma, the TCH asthma educator also provides one-on-one smoking cessation counselling to inpatients, outpatients and TCH staff.
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