Asthma and obesity in the Middle East region: An overview.

This paper aims to cover the current status of asthma and obesity in the Middle East, as well as to introduce the various studies tying the two diseases; further expanding on the proposed mechanisms. Finally, the paper covers recent literature related to sphingolipids and its role in asthma, followed by recommendations and future directions. In preparation of this paper, we searched PubMed and Google Scholar, with no restrictions, using the following terms; asthma, obesity, Middle East, sphingolipids. We also used the reference list of retrieved articles to further expand on the pool of articles that were used for this review.