Thunderstorm asthma kills 3 in Australia: What is it?

An unusual combination of weather conditions leading to a freak illness known as thunderstorm asthma has left three people dead in Australia.

An unusual combination of weather conditions leading to a freak illness known as thunderstorm asthma has left three people dead in Australia.

Hundreds of people were rushed to hospital Monday with breathing problems in the southern Australian state of Victoria as emergency services struggled to cope.

During a four hour period Monday, Ambulance Victoria received more than 1,900 calls, or one call every four to five seconds. An extra 60 ambulances were deployed, as well as police and firefighters.

Freak incident

Thunderstorm asthma occurs when a storm hits during a period of unusually high rye grass pollen, said Robin Ould, chief executive of the Asthma Foundation of Australia.

“When you have a perfect storm coming together (of) a very high pollen day, high humidity, and a thunderstorm, the grains of rye grass absorb water with the humidity and they break up into thousands of pieces,” Ould said.

“Normally with rye grass the pollen would be trapped by nose hairs. When it breaks up it goes straight to the lungs.”

The pollen irritates the lungs’ bronchial tubes, causing them to become inflamed and filled with mucus and making it hard for people to breathe.

Pollen levels peak in late spring. When this combines with strong winds, rain and high temperatures, as it did in Victoria this week, it can lead to incidents of thunderstorm asthma.

Edward Newbigin, a professor of biosciences at the University of Melbourne, said that many of those affected may never have had an asthma attack before.

“I imagine it was absolutely terrifying,” he said.

Of more than 2,500 people surveyed by the university, 74% said they experienced asthma during the storm. Of those, 32% had never experienced an asthma attack before.

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