Increases In Allergy Caused By Women's Lib?
By Thomas Ogren, Thu Dec 8th

Increase in Caused By Women’s Lib? Thomas Leo Ogren

Recently my brother-in-law, a college professor, was seeing afamous San Diego allergist, who I’ll not name. He tried to tellthe allergist all about my book, Allergy-Free Gardening. Theallergist dismissed it all as unimportant and then told him,“You want to know why there’s so much nowadays?” Mybrother-in-law said that, yes, he certainly did want to know.“Women’s Lib,” said the learned doctor. “Women used to stay homewhere they belonged and they took care of the kids and kepttheir houses neat and clean. Now, well, now they all have tohave jobs, just like the men, and who’s taking care of thehouse? Nobody! That’s why there’s so much now. Theirhouses are filthy and covered with dust.” My brother-in-lawwasn’t quite sure what to make of that. I have an answer forthat doctor. An increase in house dust isn’t driving the allergyrates sky-high. Not even close. What’s gone up is the amount ofpollen in our cities. In some areas, Tucson, Arizona, forexample, there is actually ten times more pollen in the airthere now than there was just thirty years ago! And I candocument that. It isn’t just Arizona either. In city after city,north and south, all around the civilized world, everywhere thatmodern, low-litter, litter-free, seedless, male landscaping hasbecome popular, pollen rates are up. Even though in many citiesthere is now less total green matter than in the past, there isstill more pollen than ever. And more allergy, too. Not long agoI was out in my own neighborhood, camera in hand, looking forsome choice high-allergy landscapes to photograph. I didn’t haveto go far. I was standing, carefully, on the public sidewalk,taking a close-up shot of some

Groundsel bush (Baccharis sp.)used as a ground cover in this front yard. An older gentlemancame out of the house, looked at me and asked, “Now, what in theworld could be worth photographing in my yard?” “I’m an allergyresearcher, Sir,” I said. “Yeah?” he asked. “Some problem here?”“This ground cover is all male,” I said. “All-male, and all ofit rather closely related to ragweed.” “Humm,” he said. “Andthat big row of junipers you’ve got there,” I said, pointing tothe side of his yard, “looks like every one of them is a male,too. That ash tree of yours, notice how it doesn’t have anyseeds?” “Yeah?” “It’s a male tree. Actually, your entire yard,everything in it except that climbing rose bush on the frontporch, all of it could have been designed to cause allergies.Anybody here have allergies?” “Sure,” he said, “my wife. She’sgot terrible allergies.” I looked at the yard full of maleground cover, all of it in full bloom. “Well,” I said, “I’d bewilling to bet she’s having allergies right now.”

“Yep,” he said, “she certainly is.”

Now, I didn’t even bother to ask him if his wife kept theirhouse spotless and dust-free. It was a nice house, in anexpensive neighborhood, and somehow I seriously doubted, thathis wife’s allergies were being caused by Women’s Lib.

Tom Ogren is the author of Allergy-Free Gardening, Ten SpeedPress. http://www.allergyfree-gardening.com

About the author:Tom Ogren, author of five published books, is a nationally knownspeaker, and does consulting for The USDA, the Canadian andAmerican Lung Associations, and for Allegra. See his work atwww.Allegra.com