US Olympic gold medal sprinter Noah Lyles has asthma. As a child it was so severe he was hospitalized many times.
And as it turns out, the so-called fastest man in the world is not the only Olympian with that chronic condition. A 2023 review in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports found that 15 to 30% of Olympic athletes are asthmatic.
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So how can someone go from being that sick with a disease that makes it hard to breathe, to being the fastest runner in the world?
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“As children grow and get older, they can have fewer symptoms,” says Robin Mayfield, MD, lead family physician at the Whittier Community Health Center in Roxbury. “But it really is a chronic illness, and it's always there in the background somewhere. It may not be as bad as it was when they were children.”
More than 14% of Boston Public Schools students have asthma. The figure is just under 10% statewide.
“More than half of our pediatric patients have asthma,” says Frederica Williams, president & CEO of the Whittier Street Health Center “Asthma is the number one issue for children showing up in the emergency room and for admissions in hospitals.”
“I have six kids, and out of six of them, four have asthma,” said Stephany Perez. “It could be the simplest thing, like, walking up and down stairs. Sometimes they're like, ‘oh my God, Ma, you know, I'm out of breath, I can't breathe.’”
Experts say low-income urban neighborhoods have higher asthma rates. There is more air pollution, hotter temperatures, and more exposure to triggers like dust mites that you might find at home.
“We have such older homes here in Massachusetts. So it causes them to be exposed to mold,” explains Tokunbo Ekpebor, Whittier’s charge nurse in the Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine Clinic.
The goal at Whittier is to help patients be proactive and to learn to control and treat their condition.
“I've never limited, children. I've tried to manage their asthma so that they can do what they would normally do as children,” explained Mayfield.
“I used to get scared for them to play sports,” says Perez. “My daughter was like, hey, I want to play squash. And I was like, OK, let's try it. And she's been doing great. She knows when she needs her asthma pump .”
Meantime, the kids with asthma and the people who treat them find inspiration in the story of Noah Lyles.
“To see him living his best life, becoming the world's fastest runner is really a role model to our children,” says Williams. "Whatever Olympics they choose in their life, we want them to have the best quality, whatever they choose to do."
It gives fifth graders hope.
“Because I can actually run pretty fast with asthma, says Jeremiah.”
As Farah says, “It makes me want to be like him.”
