In this week, about 3 days ago, there was a morning I suddenly could not stop sneezing. I thought my hay fever had begun although it was a little bit later than the starting day of hay fever this year. It was March 3rd, I remember. Since my husband and staff started to keep sneezing, we all took the symptom as a sign of the start of hay fever without doubt.
The amount of cedar pollen in the air this year was expected in January to be 5 to 10 times larger than a usual year. If you go to a drug store, you will see medicines, eye-drops, nasal drops and many kinds of masks as hay fever goods. However, on that day, I was informed that hay fever is not the only cause for my sneeze from TV. There was one more thing.
On that day, TV news was reporting yellow sand from china already having covered Japanese islands earlier than usual. It was providing a scenery of cars covered completely white with the yellow sand. I found it true as I look at my car. My car is clean and shiny usually, but it was colored like it had been dredged with soybean flour on that day. A diameter of yellow sand is smaller than pollen. It is nanosize. It became clear that my runny nose, itchy eye and sneeze of that day were in fact caused by a combination of pollen and yellow sand. There are many theories about the functions of yellow sand, but one clear theory explains that the yellow sand nowadays contains various kinds of oxidized air-pollution substances, so if you have hay fever and inhale the yellow sand or yellow dust, the symptoms will be accelerated and you will suffer more. The protein in pollen causes allergic reaction in your body, an antibody called IgE antibody is produced and accumulates. When this antibody surpasses a certain level as if water spills out of a bucket, allergy-causing chemical substances like histamine are released and trigger the allergic symptoms like itchy eye or runny nose.
(Kagawa News)
However, not only pollen but also yellow sand accumulates in this bucket like water. So it is clear that an allergic reaction happens faster if you inhale yellow sand too.
A very effective way to prevent these pollen and yellow sand is to increase humidity to 50% or 60% if you are at home. The humidity is now from 20% to 25% in Tokyo. If you increase it to 50% to 60% with a humidifier, the dry air in the room transforms the moisture into small negative ions, of which function is to remove positive ions of pollen and yellow sand.
Thus, neutralized dusts including pollen and yellow sand fall down to the floor. It cleans the air in the room and keeps you from inhaling them. You don’t want to underestimate a humidifier. It is important to set a humidifier and a hygrometer in each room in this season. You will have a much better sleep if you humidify at night too.
This is just an aside, but I’ve watched various Korean TV dramas and one of the most interesting scenes of them are scenes at hospital. When the leading character of “Winter Sonata” Choi Ji Woo is in the hospital, when Bae Yong Joon is in the hospital, and even in other dramas, there is always a humidifier by the bed. I was surprised to see that humidifiers were already taken as granted in Korea as scenery of a hospital room. I suppose Japanese hospitals are still behind them in this aspect.
