Health Matters

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How bad allergy seasons affect your health

By Jamie Ducharme

Health Correspondent

This spring, for the first time in my adult life, I had an ear infection. When I complained about it to family and friends (sorry, family and friends), a bunch of them mentioned that an unusual number of people in their lives also recently had ear infections.

I wondered if this painful trend could be related to this year’s bad allergy season, which left many people—myself included—sniffly and congested for weeks. It turns out that it might be. Lingering allergies can increase your risk for multiple complications, from asthma attacks to sinus, ear, and respiratory infections, experts told me.

That’s not great news, since allergy seasons are getting more intense as climate change leads to shorter, milder winters. As pollen counts rise and allergy seasons drag on longer, we may all be in for unpleasant springs ahead—unless, as experts recommended, we start reaching for the allergy meds earlier and earlier.

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Big corporations are gobbling up primary-care practices

Primary-care practices in the U.S. are overworked. That’s part of the appeal for corporations—like CVS Health and Amazon—that are buying them up at a rapid clip so they can absorb the smaller practices' many patients, reports Reed Abelson for the New York Times.

But while it may be good for profits, the consolidation of medical care isn’t necessarily good for patients or doctors, experts say.

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Today's newsletter was written by Jamie Ducharme and Mandy Oaklander, and edited by Angela Haupt.

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