 I am Dr. Padmasudaram from the Department of Respiratory Medicine, Manipal Hospital. It gives me great pleasure in celebrating World Asthma Day, which is usually celebrated on the first Tuesday of every year in May. Asthma has seen an increase over the last many years. One because people are getting identified much earlier. The treatment of Asthma has also been changed over the last 15 years. We in the Department of Respiratory Medicine have been dealing with Asthma cases for the last 15 to 20 years. Usually Asthma is a genetic disease. It runs in families and patients usually have a combination of allergies in their skin and respiratory system. In the respiratory system, we see these type of allergies both in adults and children and patients generally present with recurrent running nose, sneezing, symptoms suggestive of hay fever and then it progresses to the lower respiratory system. The incidence of Asthma has definitely gone up over the last 15 to 20 years because of an increased incidence of air pollution also contributed by smoking. The diagnosis remains very easy in the form of spirometry and if spirometry has not been able to confirm, we have in our department advanced pulmonary function test to enable a definite diagnosis of Asthma. Patients need to be diagnosed earlier because this is a disease which can be prevented from worsening and from losing lung functions. Patients can lead a normal and healthy life in spite of having Asthma and there are examples of patients who are even running on Olympics. It is important that the diagnosis is done in the correct way by specialist test as well as the treatment is instituted at the earliest. The treatment of Asthma continues to remain preventive in the form of inhaled and nasal steroids and patients need to understand that they need to be on this preventive treatment even if they feel better. There are a lot of misconceptions about the treatment of Asthma and especially about steroids and we need to know that these medicines are absolutely safe and they keep the lung health going over the long period of time. If we do not treat and prevent Asthma over the next few years patients' lung functions will definitely deteriorate and they would become more and more breathless. Nowadays with easier diagnostic techniques newer treatments are also available in the department for complicated cases in the form of newer biological agents which have come out to the market. With all this the life of an asthmatic has become much more better and it is no longer a disease of concern until the disease is diagnosed and treated properly. Thank you.