CDC's National Asthma Control Program

In 1999, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) began developing its National Asthma Control Program with funding of $1.2 million. The program supports the goals and objectives of Healthy People 2010 for asthma and is based on the following three public health principles:

• Tracking: collecting and analyzing data on an ongoing basis to understand when, where, and in whom asthma occurs
• Interventions: assuring that scientific information is translated into public health practices and programs to reduce the burden of asthma
• Partnerships: making sure that all stakeholders have the opportunity to be involved in developing, implementing, and evaluating local asthma control programs

The goals of the program are to reduce the number of deaths, hospitalizations, emergency department visits, school or work days missed, and limitations on activity due to asthma.

With appropriations of $27.9 million in fiscal year 2001, CDC funded 13 asthma tracking projects, 45 asthma interventions, and 30 asthma partnership projects under its National Asthma Control Program. CDC also funded six urban school districts and six national nongovernmental organizations to support and address asthma control within a coordinated school health program. With appropriations of about $35 million in fiscal year 2002, CDC will increase its support for (1) improving the nation’s ability to track asthma, conduct interventions, and build partnerships related to asthma control and (2) improving the ability of the nation’s schools to prevent asthma attacks and absences.

Other CDC Asthma Activities

CDC is supporting the Americans Breathing Easier Program, which enables the nation’s schools to prevent asthma attacks and related absences. In addition to these projects and programs, CDC also supports the collection of data on self-reported lifetime and current asthma rate data for adults through the state-based Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and collects data on asthma rates, mortality, and health care use through various CDC data tracking systems. For a summary of and access to CDC’s asthma tracking data, see the "Data" section at https://www.cdc.gov/asthma/asthmadata.htm.