<p>This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.</p> <p>The increased incidence of allergic asthma in the human population worldwide has stimulated many explanatory theories. A concomitant decrease in air quality leads to epidemiological and laboratory-based studies to demonstrate a link between air pollutants and asthma. Specifically, ozone, environmental tobacco smoke, and diesel exhaust are associated with enhancement of respiratory allergy to inhaled allergens. This review summarizes the state of the knowledge, both human epidemiology and laboratory animal experiments, linking air pollution to allergy. Critical issues involve development of the lung and the fetal immune response, and the potential for substances like ozone and ETS in the air to modulate early immune responses with lifelong consequences.</p>
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Clin Dev Immunol. 2003 Jun-Dec; 10(2-4):119-126