Spring Allergies

Medical professionals are gearing up to face a medical condition that affects up to 50 million Americans, costs those people more than $3 billion, and hits up employers up for more than $250 million. What's this disease we need to prepare for?

Why, it's the arrival of spring -- in particular, the arrival of spring allergies. Yes, watery and itchy eyes, sneezing, and runny and itchy noses are on their way. More seriously for many people, the pollens and molds unleashed in spring can trigger asthma, an inflammation of the air passages that makes it hard to breathe.

How do these substances -- these allergens -- cause such annoying and expensive-to-treat reactions? They do it by getting the immune systems to overreact among people who have the allergies. For example, when the body senses the presence of a pollen that it has encountered before, it ramps up production of antibodies, which attach themselves to special allergy cells called mast cells.

The mast cells then release histamines, which go about creating all those irritating symptoms. According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, about 36 million Americans suffer from the most common springtime allergy -- allergic rhinitis, better known as hay fever

March 23, 2002

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