The new definition of asthma. “Asthma is a heterogeneous disease, usually characterized by chronic airway inflammation. It is defined by the history of respiratory symptoms such as wheeze, shortness of breath, chest tightness and cough that vary over time and in intensity, together with variable expiratory airflow limitation.” The term “asthma” is now deliberately used as an umbrella term like “anaemia”, “arthritis” and “cancer”; these terms are very useful for communication with patients and for advocacy, and they facilitate clinical recognition of heterogeneous diseases that have readily recognisable clinical features in common. By contrast with anaemia, arthritis and cancer, evidence about the underlying mechanisms in asthma is much less well-established, with most existing evidence coming from patients with long-standing and clinically severe asthma; further research in broader populations is needed. However, an overarching principle in the new GINA report is the importance of individualising patient management not only by using genomics or proteomics, but also with “humanomics” [19], taking into account the behavioural, social and cultural factors that shape outcomes for individual patients.