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Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Inhaling CO2 may help with allergies -- study

Here's an interesting new study that shows that squirting carbon dioxide (CO2) up a person's nose makes allergy symptoms go away, and they don't come back for another four hours.

It sounds corny, yet I'm all for it.  There really is nothing that relieves allergy symptoms, and if squirting CO2 into my nares will do the trick during those irritating allergy exacerbations so be it.

The experiment involved a 10-second burst of carbon dioxide into the nares, and relief came in less than 30 seconds, and lasted four hours.  This small amount of inhaled CO2 is believed to be safe for humans.

If inhaling CO2 sounds corny in and of itself, the article doesn't stop there.  It ends with:  "It may not be an easy treatment to get approved because...."

Now I was thinking because inhaling too much CO2 might cause a person to stop breathing.  Yet that's not it at all. 

The reason it may never be approved by the FDA -- no matter how safe and effective it's proven to be -- is because -- drum roll please: "...carbon dioxide is thought to contribute to global climate change."

Here a treatment may relieve millions of poeple from suffering from agonizing allergies, yet they -- the powers that can provide that relief -- probably won't allow it based on a theory.


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