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Asthma, Kids, and Day Care: Media Hopes vs. Facts
By Richard Morin, The Washington Post, October 1, 2000, p. B5
According to a Washington Post report, the relationship between childrens' day care attendance and developing asthma later in childhood may depend upon who prints the "story" -- The New England Journal of Medicine or The Boston Globe.
A study by a team of physicians that was published in The New England Journal of Medicine on August 24th found that infants who attended day care during the first six months of their lives were less likely to develop asthma later in childhood. But while the headlines in The Boston Globe and other newspapers touted the study, the study itself found that any exposure of children to other children on a regular intimate basis helped boost childrens' immunity to asthma.
Other recent studies published in the Journal of the American Medical Association and Pediatrics documented the negative effects of day care on children's health. According to one media watchdog, cultural anthropologist David Murray, journalists give reports suggesting benefits from day care and children's health prominent attention because such research reassures journalists who have young children enrolled in day care that they are personally doing the right thing for their children.
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