Nothing to sneeze at: Fighting allergies

Spring is in the air, you say? Why, then, bless you! As the trees burst into bloom, people are breaking out in hay fever, or "allergic rhinitis", sneezing and wheezing, coughing and itching, blowing their noses — and hoping for rain. More and more people are suffering from allergies. In the US, 30 per cent of adults and 40 per cent of children are now sensitive specifically to pollen.

Why are allergies more prevalent today? For one thing, city streets are more allergenic than they once were. For years, city gardeners have preferred pollen-bearing male plants over the messier seed-bearing female ones. Second, there are fewer kinds of trees than there used to be. When city-dwellers are overexposed to the same kind of pollen, they are likely to develop some kind of allergy. Add to this the extension of the flowering season, which is said to go on for ten days longer than it did 30 years ago, and you have at least part of the answer.

Yogis recommend an ancient Ayurvedic technique, the Jal Neti nasal douche: Reduce congestion by flushing out your nostrils and sinuses with warm saline water. If you don't like the idea of water up your nose, you can always try the "ringtone therapy" devised by Dr Matsumo Suzuki of the Japan Ringing Tone Laboratory. The sound is supposed to dislodge the pollen when you hold the phone up to your nose. Index, the mobile-phone content provider which markets the ringtones, admits the technology is just a little unproven. But people are having fun, and that in itself is nothing to sneeze at.

Do our quick review of basic medical vocabulary on the next page.

Anne Hodgson