Chronic Conditions Now Afflict Approximately 1 in 3 Young People in the U.S.

Chronic conditions have become much more prevalent over the last twenty years or so, with new research suggesting that nearly “1 in 3 young people” are living with “pediatric onset conditions that significantly affect their lives.”

Lauren Wisk, the study’s lead author, said that the rise is “largely driven by ADHD/ADD, autism, asthma, prediabetes, and depression/anxiety.” She also said that “youth who are subject to socioeconomic vulnerability such as having less education, lower income, are on public insurance, or unemployed are all more likely to live with a chronic condition than youth with socioeconomic advantages.”

The researchers analyzed nationally representative data for around 236,500 participants aged 5 to 25 years. They found that the frequency in chronic conditions “among children ages 5 to 17 years rose from about 23% in 1999/2000 to more than 30% by 2017/2018. This amounts to an estimated annual increase of .24 percentage points or 130,000 additional children per year.” Among young adults aged 18 to 25, the prevalence increased from 18.5% to 29% over the same period.

Wisk emphasized that “nearly all of the conditions are treatable with access to high quality healthcare,” which the U.S. health system “doesn’t always provide.”

Limitations to the study include “a reliance on self- or caregiver-reported conditions, which is subject to recall bias, and the researchers’ ability to examine trends in some specific conditions was limited by the low prevalence of certain conditions.”