Prevalence and risk factors for allergic comorbidities in Australian children and Asian children living in Singapore and Australia

Project information

There is increasing evidence that the risk of allergic disease differs according to both ancestry and the environment in early life. Infants with Asian background born in Australia are known to have a high risk of food allergy than those with Caucasian background. It has also been shown recently that this increased risk extends to other allergic diseases as well. The HealthNuts study have shown that eczema and food allergy at age 1 increases the risk of asthma and allergic rhinitis at age 6. The prevalence of allergic rhinitis, eczema and aeroallergen sensitization, but not asthma, were higher in the Australian Asians than in Caucasians (Suaini et al, 2018). However, the prevalence of these allergic conditions appears much lower in Asians in Singapore compared with the Australian Asian population. Using data from two cohorts in MCRI (HealthNuts) and SICS (GUSTO), we have also previously shown that food allergy prevalence in Singaporean Asians are lower than that of Australian Asians (publication in progress).
This calls into question the role of environmental influences contributing to the differences in prevalence observed. Utilizing data from two comprehensive and well-characterized cohorts, HealthNuts and GUSTO, will enable comparison of prevalence in different population groups and study the contributing factors to the differences in prevalence.

Objectives:
1. To assess differences in allergic disease prevalence between three populations: Caucasians (HealthNuts), Australian Asians (HealthNuts) and Singaporean Asians (GUSTO)
2. To assess contribution of selected risk factors to differences in prevalence of allergic diseases