Pollen microscope view. Paris suburb, Versailles Chantiers train station, France. 26 june 2023.

Pollens: how climate change is making our allergies worse

Allergic respiratory pathologies, such as seasonal rhinitis and asthma, have almost doubled in twenty years in industrialized countries.

Watery eyes, itchy throats, runny noses—all immune reactions that doctors call "allergic rhinitis." In France, nearly one in three adults suffer from a pollen allergy, according to the National Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health Safety (Anses).

More than in the past? As early as 2008, an epidemiological study confirmed that in France the number of pollen rhinitis had tripled in twenty-five years. A few years later, ANSES wrote in a 2014 report that "the prevalence of allergic respiratory pathologies such as seasonal rhinitis and asthma has practically doubled over the past twenty years in industrialized countries".

Altered seasons
Climate change is one of the causes considered to explain such an explosion of allergies. In the spring, to reproduce, so-called "anemophilous" plants release large amounts of pollen, relying only on the wind to carry them to female flowers.


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