Belyhun et al. BMC Public Health 2010, 10:21 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/10/21 Department of Biology, Addis Ababa University; the Wellcome Trust; Asthma UK; and the UK Association of Physicians for funding the project. We are also grateful to the study participants and the data collectors of Butajira birth cohort. Author details 1Aklilu Lemma Institute of Pathobiology, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 2School of Public Health, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 3Division of Epidemiology & Public Health, the University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK. 4Department of Psychiatry, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Authors’ contributions GD, JB, AV, CH & GM conceived the idea for this study. GM, GD, CH, BE, YB and AA participated in the design and conduct of the study. YB and GM were responsible for the accuracy of the data. AAm and YB drafted the manuscript. AAm and AV guarantee the statistical analysis. 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