Known colloquially as “kafunsho” (花粉症), allergic rhinitis is one of the most common allergic diseases in Japan. Known to us westerners as hay fever, this epidemic is responsible for sneezes, runny noses, plugged ears, and itchy eyes all over Japan. And with mid-February fast approaching, the time for hay fever hell is nigh. So what’s so different about allergy season in Japan?

In Japan, hay fever is kind of a big deal. Estimates suggest that anywhere from 15-30% of Japan’s population suffers from hay fever each and every year. The pollen from Japan’s sugi trees are prevalent in the atmosphere between mid-February and late April, and the pollen from the hinoki trees last from early April to about mid-May. That’s a good three months of pollen induced pain. For more information on the nitty gritty details of hay fever in Japan, you can check out this great post from the Nagoya International Center here. But the bottom line is that there’s a lot of pollen in Japan and hay fever season is a force to be reckoned with over there.

How People Deal with Hay Fever in Japan

In Japan there are tons of products designed specifically for sufferers of hay fever. Ranging from medical products to special masks and eye-wear, they’ve pretty much got something for everyone and once allergy season starts, convenience store shelves are stocked full with them.

Hiroko from HirokoChannel does a great job here in this video detailing all of the stuff that starts to become available in Japan once spring and the pollen starts to roll in. Some of you may remember Hiroko from my Awesome Japanese YouTubers post. Her videos are always so useful!

[yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afTXMuzU4xI']

And here’s another invention that only Japan would come up with – the mighty pollen detector. They installed 700 of these things across Japan to monitor the amount of allergens in the atmosphere and update the pollen data second by second. Hospitals, schools, and households across the country volunteered to install these pollen robots on their properties to help map the pollen as it spreads across the land.

Using laser technology, the machine counts the number of pollen particles blown into the ball. It also uses sensors to monitor the local temperature, atmospheric pressure, and humidity. For those interested, you can read more about them here.

[yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3JB59N09Qw']

So as you can see, pollen is a much bigger deal in Japan than it is in America (and probably a lot of other places too). Every year thousands of Japanese people dread the coming of the pollen apocalypse. But why is there such a ridiculous amount of pollen in Japan in the first place?

Why Japan Has So Much Pollen

A great deal of the pollen in Japan comes from their cedar trees. But why does Japan have so much cedar anyway? Between the 50s and 70s, around 4.5 million hectares of cedar trees were planted in an attempt to meet the growing need for construction material in Japan. However, it eventually became more economical to import lumber which soon made the cedar plantations obsolete. As the cedar forests matured, the amount of cedar pollen in the air increased and the number of hay fever sufferers multiplied. Apparently, even the monkeys are suffering. No, seriously – they are.

These troublesome cedar forests look like they’ll be sticking around though as the government plans to reduce Japan’s ceder are neither ambitious nor well funded. Good thing there’s a real-time pollen map of Japan that makes use of those nifty pollen detecting robots mentioned earlier. And if you want to read more about this, you can check out some useful info on the epidemic’s very own Wikipedia page.

And here are some quotes from annual Japanese sufferers of hay fever that I found on GlobalVoicesOnline.

It’s that time of the year again. The most depressing season of the year for me – kafunsho season. Some people are only affected in the eyes or nose, but I get both and it’s really tough. I must go out and buy eye drops, masks, medicine, yogurt…
-eternal_name

Pollen is flying around already… sniffle. I’ll cry if it’s bad on my exam day. I wish universities would take kafunsho into consideration. Not suffering from kafunsho would be such a great advantage in this world…
-Mizuka Yukizawa

As of two years ago, whenever I go outside during this season I get bleary eyes. It happened again this year, and just on the day that the pollen started flying. I haven’t thought about it because I didn’t want to consider it, but I think now that this must be kafunsho.
-SOW

So with so many people in Japan being all red-nosed and depressed, what is being done to lift people’s spirits?

Fighting Fever with Allergy Anime

[yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q95_Nxcm9H8']

Lately Japan has been taking a new angle on the annual allergy abomination Japan faces. And of course the answer is anime. The video above is the latest creation from an unbeatable duo of anime girls out to combat hay fever in Japan. But who is the benevolent corporation behind these allergy assassins? That’d be Rohto Pharmaceutical. Most will probably recognize the name Rohto from their line of popular eye drops, but they are also involved in contact lens care, skin care, and a variety of medicines and supplements.

Headquartered in Osaka, Rohto Pharmaceutical has been promoting these characters known as the “Alguard Sisters” for their hay fever countermeasures campaign that began last year. This year however, the sisters finally have their very own opening animation sequence. As to why, I’m not sure. But will this new anime clip do much to combat the disease? Only time will tell.

And why are they called the Alguard sisters? Well, “Alguard” is a broad name for all of Rohto’s hay fever countermeasure products that include eye lotions, eye washes, rhinitis sprays, nasal irrigation fluids, masks, and so on. The company also has a Twitter and Facebook page to show off their stuff along with the Alguard Sisters.

Personally I don’t really understand the appeal of the Alguard sisters. It’s not like they’re actually doing anything to help combat hay fever. I mean, all they’re really doing is drawing attention to a disease that pretty much everyone in Japan already knows about. If anything it’s just drawing attention to Rohto’s products made to specifically combat the symptoms of hay fever in Japan. But there’s really no mention of Rohto in the anime promo at all. What do you guys think about this? Seems kinda silly to me. You’d figure most people would already know about what products are available over there with hay fever being such a huge deal and all.

So tell me – do you suffer from seasonal allergies? Ever been to Japan during hay fever hell? Wish you had cool allergy inventions and anime promotions in your home country too? Let us know in the comments!

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