I'm a sufferer myself. I don't know for sure for how long because I was a terrible chain smoker once upon a time. Coughing was just part of the deal. About 6 months after I stopped smoking, I was diagnosed as an asthmatic. fortunately, it's pretty darned mild compared with some people I know. I've never had what I would call an asthma attack, and while I carry the salbutamol inhaler around all the time, I pretty much never use it. I use flovent every morning and that seems to do the trick.

>My brother had severe asthma when he was young. He finally quit having attacks in his late teens and after living in Colorado for a few years. Wisconsin was terrible for his asthma.
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>>>>Kids have died or gone into anaphylactic shock because of mere traces. I don't think it's a question of 'buying into the allergy culture'.
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>>>I had in mind the exaggerations where you buy cheese and there's a warning that it may contain milk, or the drugs which make you resistant to cat hair allergy for a while at the price of who knows what side effects, and the doctors' habit to ascribe to allergy anything they can't explain. The same doctors would say it's "on nerve basis" or "psychosomatic" back in my neck of the woods. So Serbia is on bensedines, while the US is on allergy drugs - and not sure that either actually helps the self-diagnosed and misdiagnosed.
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>>>>These allergies are very real and very serious. Whether they come from the way of life etc, I don't know. Maybe they're genetically produced for all I know. What I do know is that I would not take the chance with other people's children I know nothing about.
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>>>But how many of them were out there last night without anyone with them knowing they're allergic?
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>>>>A guy I work with was stung by a bee one weekend while playing softball. For the next 3 days, his foot was about 3 times it's normal size. I don't think it was because he'd bought into the culture; I think it was because he was allergic to the bee venom
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>>>My first programming boss was one of those. He was really concerned about it - and his wife was a doctor, so he knew what was up, and his fear was that a bee would sting when there's no transportation at hand, and he may have had minutes only if it happened.
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>>>These guys are for real. The culture usually doesn't get built around nothing. I'm just saying that there's too much of allergy talk being tossed about; too many drugs are supposed to cure or at least alleviate symptoms; too much money is at stake therefore.
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>>>Which still doesn't mean I should put a "this house is peanut infested" on my door. Anyone whose kids are allergic to something should know that and accompany them on the very night when they're prone to get food from suspect sources, not make it everybody else's worry.
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>>And how do you suppose most parents find out that their kid has a peanut allergy? Do you have your kids allergy tested on a regular basis? Most find out the hard way, and if they're lucky, there is no real damage.
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>>>A question: I've heard of peanut allergy and how dangerous can it be about the time we came here. Not before (IOW, it was unknown back home; we do eat peanuts as such, but don't use them as ingredient in food and specially not in cakes and condiments; however, hazelnuts, almonds and walnuts are quite common; still, haven't ever heard of anyone being alergic to that). I assume these allergies were around before my time - so, how come that I've witnessed the movement to get peanut (and other nut) food out of school cafeterias? Dangerous as it is, shouldn't it have been dealt with long ago, like - decades ago? I don't understand that part.
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>>Frankly, I don't either. I suspect, but only suspect, that as our world becomes more and more inimical to human life, some people's systems develop adversity to certain stimuli. I don't really have any idea, but for example, asthma is not a bad case in point. It's always been around, but certainly not in anything like the numbers we see today. I attribute the fantastic growth in asthma cases to the increasingly hostile environment we live in.