The latest alarmist talking point is that “global warming will cause asthma in children.” To wit,  the Massachusetts League of Women Voters is running sleazy advertisements that essentially equate baby-abuse with Senator Scott Brown’s vote for excellent legislation that would strip the Environmental Protection Agency of the authority to regulate greenhouse gases. The purported link between baby-abuse and global warming is increased asthma.

It’s not just lobbyists. At a recent House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on global warming policy, Democrats on the panel—in particular, Reps. Henry Waxman and Jay Inslee—made much hay about the supposed increase in asthma suffering in a warmer world.

The media, too, is parroting this talking point. Here’s Brad Johnson at the Wonk Room:

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), after a recent vote to protect coal polluters at the expense of children’s health, is now attacking the League of Women Voters. The 91-year-old good-government organization is running television spots that hold McCaskill and Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) accountable for voting to block enforcement of Clean Air Act rules that limit greenhouse pollution, threatening the hundreds of thousands of children with asthma in their states.

Clearly, this claim that warmer temperatures will increase asthma is reverberating throughout the vast green echo chamber. But is it true? The claim is predicated on the hypothesis that global warming will cause longer growing seasons, which will result in the release of more pollen, an asthma trigger. OK…that makes some intuitive sense, and while there is peer review literature suggesting a link between asthma and pollen, there is also literature contesting such a link (“No association was found between visits for asthma attacks and airborne pollen levels,” Association of severe asthma attacks with weather, pollen, and air pollutants,” 0 V J Rossi, V L Kinnula, J Tienari, E Huhti, Thorax 1993; 48:244-248).

As I understand it, and as is intimated by the conflicting studies noted above, asthma is poorly understood. There does, however, appear to be agreement in the scientific community that asthma has many potential causes, including pollen, dust mites, cigarette smoke, and…cold weather. According to the peer reviewed literature, “A decrease in air temperature is an aggravating factor for asthmatic symptoms, regardless of the geo-climatic areas under study” (c.f., “Effects of Climate Change on Environmental Factors in Respiratory Allergic Diseases,” G. D’Amato and L. Cecchi, Clinical and Experimental Allergy, 38, 1264-1274). Cold weather triggers asthma directly, and also indirectly, by making people sick with cold and flu, which is another major asthma trigger (“Upper respiratory infections play a key role in exacerbation of asthma, contributing to the typical increase of hospitalizations and medical calls in cold months and during spring,” ibid).

Using a public health/medicine database search (EBESCO’s MEDLINE), I found peer reviewed research suggesting a link between global warming and asthma exacerbation due to increased pollen exposure caused by longer growing seasons, but I couldn’t find any study that also addressed the fact that global warming logically would mitigate asthma suffering caused by the cold. After all, if asthma hospitalizations peak during cold months, then doesn’t it stand to reason that global warming, which disproportionately affects winters, would decrease the number of these asthma attacks? If I’m wrong, and a study has considered the potential benefits of global warming for asthmatics, please send it my way: wyeatman@cei.org. Until I see otherwise, it seems to me that the green echo chamber’s alarmist asthma claims are based on only half the picture.

In any case, Americans shouldn’t be concerned. According to a recent peer reviewed article in the pre-eminent scholarly journal Science, global warming isn’t happening in the U.S.

The House of Representatives took the first step on Thursday toward reclaiming its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.  The Energy and Power (yes, that really is its name) Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee marked up and passed H. R. 910, the Energy Tax Prevention Act, which is sponsored by Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.).  H. R. 910 would pre-empt EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions using the Clean Air Act unless and until explicitly authorized to do so by Congress.

Actually, there was no marking up.  The Democrats opposed to the bill offered no amendments, and the bill was passed on a voice vote.  The full Committee has scheduled a mark-up of the bill next Monday and Tuesday. That means H. R. 910 could come to the House floor by early April.  There is no doubt that it will pass the House by a wide margin.  The only question is how many Democrats will end up voting for it.  My guess is that quite a few Democrats are worried about getting re-elected and will therefore vote for it.

The subcommittee meeting was one long whine by minority Democrats.  Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Beverly Hills), the ranking Democrat on the full committee and chief sponsor of the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill that failed in the last Congress, said that H. R. 910 would codify science denial.  Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) chimed in that he was worried the Republicans would try to repeal the law of gravity.  Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) instead thought that Republicans were trying to repeal the first law of thermodynamics and cause children all over the world to get asthma.

Preventing asthma is now the principal reason brought forward by the global warming alarmists in Congress to cripple the U. S. economy with energy-rationing regulations.  Here is what I learned from a ninety-second internet search: “The majority of people with asthma notice that cold, dry air causes more symptoms than mild-temperature or hot, humid air.” Of course, some of the world’s most eminent climate scientists have recently found that global warming is causing a lot of cold weather.

Inslee always plays the obnoxious buffoon, but he was outdone at the subcommittee meeting by Rep. Michael Doyle (D-Penna.).  Doyle claimed that EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gas emissions would not send any jobs overseas because existing manufacturing plants would not have to apply for permits under the rules already proposed.  Only new or expanded plants have to apply for permits.  Thus only new jobs are being destroyed by EPA regulations, and no one in an existing job has anything to worry about.  I know this sounds unbelievably stupid, but this is an accurate summary of the point Doyle was making.  As the committee counsel tried to explain to Doyle, even that point is true only until EPA finishes implementing emissions rules for existing facilities.