Not only is it kickoff time for college football season, but it’s also prime time for fall allergies. For the 50 million Americans who suffer from ragweed allergy, the late summer and early fall signal the onset of runny noses, sneezing, congestion, cough, itchy watery eyes, and in more severe cases, sinus infections and asthma exacerbations.
Seasonal allergies are a huge source of frustration and fatigue for many of us, causing symptoms beginning as early as late July in the southern U.S. states and continuing through October or later.
Here are eight fascinating facts about ragweed allergy:
1. Ragweed is found in 49 out of the 50 US states, including Hawaii, and there are 17 different types of ragweed!
2. Ragweed pollen levels peak in the morning. Keeping your bedroom windows closed overnight and car windows closed on your drive to work can be helpful to decrease exposure.
3. Unlike the spring pollen season, which begins based on temperature, ragweed pollination is triggered by the length of daylight. This means you can set an alert in your calendar to remember to start your allergy medications early before ragweed season starts.
4. Ragweed is an annual, meaning plants only live for one season, but each plant can release up to 1 billion pollen grains! These grains are lightweight and can stay airborne, traveling up to 400 miles.
5. Many people think that they are getting less exposure to pollen by living in the city, but this is an urban myth! Urban areas are warmer with up to 30 percent more carbon dioxide, resulting in the formation of “urban heat islands.” One study, in particular, showed that cities could have up to 7x more ragweed pollen than the surrounding rural area!
6. Several studies have demonstrated that climate change has caused longer pollen seasons and higher pollen levels. Additionally, an increase in carbon dioxide causes ragweed plants to produce more pollen. This effect becomes more prominent further north.
7. Some people with ragweed allergy may experience mouth itching or swelling when eating certain foods called oral allergy syndrome. Bananas, melons, cucumbers, zucchini, white potatoes, and sunflower seeds are the most common culprits. Often, peeling and cooking these foods can decrease symptoms.
8. Local honey is not a substitute for allergy shots. Although honey does have some anti-inflammatory properties and is quite helpful for sore throats and coughs, it does not contain sufficient amounts of the pollens we become allergic to in order to create an immunologic response.
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And more importantly, here are five quick tips for symptom control:
1. Corticosteroid nasal sprays are most effective for nasal congestion but require 2 to 4 weeks of use to reach their full effect. Technique is also critical. Point your nose toward your toes, aim the nozzle toward your ear on the same side as your nostril, and don’t sniff or snort the medication. Dab any excess.
2. Over-the-counter antihistamines come in tablets and nasal sprays now. Allergists by and large recommend avoiding 1st generation antihistamines (diphenhydramine) due to safety concerns. Loratadine, cetirizine, fexofenadine, and now azelastine nasal spray are all great alternatives.
3. Decongestants are great in a pinch, but remember they have more medication interactions and side effects. Additionally, they should not be used long term due to the concern for developing rebound congestion (rhinitis medicamentosa).
4. Don’t forget about eye drops. These are great to add on for those extra tough days. Keep them in the fridge to minimize burning and stinging and provide a bit of soothing relief.
5. Don’t overlook the power of sinus saline rinses or sprays. These can help flush out mucus and pollen. Think of these as a shower for your nasal passageways. It can take a bit of trial and error to find which formulation and technique is best for you.
Last but not least, if you are ready to tackle ragweed allergy for the long term, chat with your local board-certified allergy-immunology physician to see if immunotherapy is an option. Although most commonly, immunotherapy comes in the form of allergy shots, more and more practices are offering sublingual and intralymphatic immunotherapy too, which eliminate needles and/or speed up the immune-modulating process.
This article is discussed on The Podcast by KevinMD: What you need to know about ragweed allergies.
Kara Wada is a quadruple board-certified pediatric and adult allergy and immunology, lifestyle, and functional medicine physician, a Sjögren’s disease specialist, and a Sjögren’s patient herself. She spent nine years on faculty at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, where she served as associate program director of the allergy and immunology fellowship and led the Mast Cell Center of Excellence.
In 2025, she left academic medicine to build the kind of practice she could not find as a patient: the Immune Confident Institute, a national direct-care immunology practice licensed in 27 states. She treats the patients the health care system sends ping-ponging between specialists, people with complex, chronic, multisystem disease including mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), dysautonomia, Sjögren’s disease, immune dysfunction, and the seronegative and “in-between” diagnoses that do not fit neatly into a single specialty.
Her premise is simple: These patients are not the problem. Fragmented care is. Medicine has become exceptionally good at looking through microscopes while losing sight of the telescope, the bigger picture of the person in front of us. Her work challenges a health care culture that demands compliance when it should assume competence, and aims to make strategic, compassionate immune-directed care the standard, and the exam room a place where patients are finally seen, heard, and believed.
Most of her reach is built outside the exam room. Her YouTube channel drew roughly two million views this past year, and more than 100,000 people follow her work across platforms, including a Sjögren’s community of about 6,600. She founded and hosts the Virtual Sjögren’s Summit, now in its sixth year and drawing some 4,300 registrants worldwide. She appears regularly on national television and in the health press, including Prevention, SELF, Good Housekeeping, WebMD, Medscape, and MedPage Today, and she writes for KevinMD on the diagnoses that live in the shadows and the medical gaslighting that surrounds them.
A TEDx speaker and sought-after keynote, Wada speaks to clinician and patient audiences about complex immune disease, the experience of being disbelieved, and what changes when the physician is also the patient. She is also an unlikely pageant titleholder, having served as Dr. Ohio America 2022 and Dr. Midwest America 2023, and has written about how pageantry sharpened skills medicine rewards but rarely teaches.
She earned her medical degree with honors from the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria and completed internal medicine-pediatrics residency, allergy and immunology fellowship, and clinician educator fellowship at The Ohio State University and Nationwide Children’s Hospital. She lives in Columbus, Ohio, with her medical school sweetheart turned husband, Akira, and their three children.
