Every Breath You Take

The 2020 bushfires and COVID-19 drew a national gasp of attention to the importance of clean air, and an organ central to your health and wellbeing: your lungs.

- Linda Moon

“The first thing we do when we’re born is inhale. The last thing we do is exhale,” says Dr Noah Greenspan, founder of the Pulmonary Wellness Foundation and the Pulmonary Wellness and Rehabilitation Center in New York. It’s a mostly automatic, unconscious action that happens about 22,000 times a day. “Breathing is a thing you take for granted until you have a problem,” remarks Greenspan, also the author of Ultimate Pulmonary Wellness published in 2017.

Your daily breath

On a global level, our lungs aren’t in good shape. World Health Organisation figures show chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) is the third leading cause of death globally. In Western countries, asthma is the most common chronic illness affecting children. Within Australia, lung cancer and COPD (obstruction of the airways caused by chronic bronchitis and/or emphysema) are in the top five causes of mortality.

While cigarette smoking is the main risk factor, its association with both diseases leads non-smokers to underestimate their risk. A 2016 study, for example, found 27 per cent of females with COPD had no history of smoking. Accumulating evidence reveals a history of asthma, air pollution, occupational exposures to toxins and dust, chronic respiratory infections, impaired lung growth in childhood and passive smoking are other key risk factors.