What? Sacramento Ranks in Top 10 Asthma Locations in the US?

Is this really news? Sacramento ranks in Top 10 asthma capitals in the nation. Did anyone fact check the claims?

“The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America’s (AAFA) Asthma Capitals® report ranks the largest 100 cities in the contiguous (“lower 48”) U.S. by how challenging they are to live in when you have asthma,” the AAFA says. “AAFA publishes this report to show the nationwide burden of asthma. It is a call to action to help the nearly 28 million people in the U.S. with asthma.”

It sounds as if the AAFA is promoting the AAFA.

We live in the Sacramento Valley, within the Northern part of the Central Valley, one of the richest agricultural areas in the West. The Sacramento Valley and the broader Central Valley rank poorly for seasonal allergies and asthma in U.S.

Sacramento sits in a topographic bowl between the Sierra Nevada and the Coast Ranges, and produces heavy loads of oak, ash, and other tree pollen; grasses and weeds add more after rain promotes growth, then wind spreads it.

Agriculture across the Central Valley adds dust and additional plant material, so symptoms often stretch beyond a short spring season. Local allergists have described the area as particularly difficult for that combination of reasons.

Here’s the BS: “The Sacramento area was found to have poor air quality, few asthma specialists and low RSV vaccination rates, leading to higher asthma rates and emergencies,” Fox 40 reported on the AAFA report. The Sacramento area does not have poor air quality. That’s BS and job security for local and state air quality bureaucrats.

Here is the Propaganda: “Low RSV vaccination rates.”

According to the CDC, the “RSV vaccine can prevent lower respiratory tract disease caused by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). RSV is a common respiratory virus that usually causes mild, cold-like symptoms.”

The CDC recommends vaccinating infants and older adults with the RSV vaccine.

The CDC doesn’t explain why, particularly since they say, “RSV is a common respiratory virus that usually causes mild, cold-like symptoms.”

This is not news. My ENT physician told me 35 years ago that Sacramento is the allergy capital of the world – a bit dramatic, but I understood what he was trying to convey after years of ineffective allergy treatments. I tested allergic to everything on the scratch test except cow hair. My doc told me to move if I ever wanted to rid myself of allergies.

Untreated allergies can be linked to a higher risk of developing or worsening asthma… not low RSV vaccination rates.

So how did Sacramento end up in the Top 10? The AAFA says the Top 10 cities “have the fewest asthma specialists per asthma patient.”

And somehow Sacramento ranked #10 ahead of Los Angeles for poor air quality? The Los Angeles basin has been long known to trap pollutants and smog closer to ground because of a thermal inversion layer. The city’s geography—surrounded by mountains on three sides—further limits horizontal air movement, worsening pollution episodes.

Sacramento isn’t located in a basin – we are in the valley, bordered by two rivers and the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.