Nov. 29, 1999
"We had allergies going all winter long-- we really had no break."
Asthma specialists remember 1977-78, when allergies along the Wasatch Front continued through the winter months along with the flu bug.
Is it happening again twenty years later?
Unless the weather changes dramatically, we may have the makings for a miserable season.
Science Specialist Ed Yeates reports.
Night falls, but the weather is still comfortable outside. And that's what worries allergy experts. Without a snow cover, allergies are still bouncing all over the place, even this late in the season.
Tim Suckle has just moved from Colorado to Utah. He's picked up cold-like symptoms here in Salt Lake - but it's NOT a cold!
Suckle: "Just a feeling like I have a cold or something like that. Kind of a scratchy throat, watery eyes, a little post nasal drip-- stuffiness feeling."
Dr. Edwin Bronsky with the Intermountain Allergy and Asthma Clinic says even though frost has already killed the weeds, the fallen pollen is still circulating -- a condition he hasn't seen for twenty years.
Edwin Bronsky, M.D. / Intermountain Allergy and Asthma Clinic: "So it's lying on the ground, it's lying in vegetation. And when the wind blows because there's no snow to cover it, this pollen can be picked up and it just goes up into the atmosphere."
And that's not all! The moderate temperatures which melted last week's short-lived snowfall have produced a ripe environment for mold - another trigger for allergies.
"And when the snow melts and it lies in the water pools and dead vegetation, this is a culture media for molds."
Now add these ingredients into the mix, along with the flu bug and parainfluenza viruses which are just now getting a start in Utah, and you have victims who could suffer from both upper nasal and lower respiratory sicknesses.
"Again, it's not the intensity of the allergy symptoms that we see with the burst of grass pollen in the spring or the burst of the tumbleweed, sage, ragweed that we see in the fall. But it will be there, low level for many people and very bothersome for others."
The State Health Department says running your furnace at night often aggravates the allergy/asthma condition.
The furnace dries our desert air out even more - irritating the respiratory tract.
