El Nino's (Achoo!) Allergies

From Montauk to Mendocino, a warm, wet winter promises bumper crops of pollen

Dr. Susan Wynn, an allergist who practices in Fort Worth, Texas, first noticed the problem at the beginning of February. Dr. William Berger of Mission Viejo, Calif., picked up on it two weeks later. That was just about when Dr. Donald Pulver of Rochester, N.Y., realized, as he puts it, that "everybody, including my wife, was complaining about itchy eyes, stuffy nose, dry cough--the classic signs of an allergy attack." Classic, except that the allergy season wasn't due to begin for at least a month.

Then the pollen counts drifted in. More than 200 particles per cu m in Rochester, twice...

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