Early spring brings allergies
The premature arrival of spring has been a curse for allergy sufferers whose trials also began early this year, doctors told a conference in Athens yesterday. The unseasonably high temperatures in Greece this year – which many blame on climate change – have «tricked» certain plants into blooming early, and provoked the allergies of about one in five citizens, the medics told the 7th Panhellenic conference on allergology and clinical immunology. «We had no real winter in Greece this year and spring came early – as a result we have seen allergy-provoking plants blooming extremely early and making life a misery for many Greeks,» said Alkis Togias, the head of the asthma and inflammation unit of the US National Institute of Health. The olive tree, a known stimulant of allergies, is expected to start becoming troublesome around Easter, in the first week of April, according to Calliope Kontou-Fili, president of the Hellenic Society of Allergology and Clinical Immunology (HSACI). A premature spring could bring a premature summer too, meaning that those with seasonal allergies will enjoy early relief, Kontou-Fili said. But if the spring period is interrupted by rain and low temperatures, the period of allergies will be extended, she said. According to Togias, around 20 percent of the population of developed countries suffer from allergies, whose incidence has increased significantly over the past 30 years. In Greece the incidence of bronchial asthma has risen sharply over the past 20 years, now affecting 9.5 percent of the population. One theory being examined by doctors is that exposing children to allergy-provoking plants at an early age may help them develop immunity.
