Post date: Jan 28, 2019 9:33:46 PM
Every spring in Tokyo comes with it a manifestation of hay fever and illness. As John Daub explains in the below live-stream, in 1945, after World War II, efforts were made to re-plant all of the lost trees that were flattened in the devastation that occurred in Tokyo. A secondary motivation for this was that rebuilding required a lot of wood. The problem was that the two species of trees that were planted were "すぎ"--Sugi, a Japanese cedar tree, and "ひのき" --Hinoki, a Japanese cypress tree. Even today, there are not enough workers in the timber industry to cut down the trees even if there is proper funding. Both of these trees, but especially Sugi, are extremely high producers of pollen.
By the 1960s, 1970s, the Japanese timber industry started a drastic decline in production. This Hay Fever gives regular influenza a significant boost in spreading from person to person. Thus, many people ware face masks during this time. The reasons would be to breath in cleaner air, cut down on allergies, limit direct contact with other people, and to limit your direct contact with other people incase you are sick. This problem is a hard one to fix due to the sheer effort required and the limited human resources to do it.
If you are considering going to Tokyo in the spring, be sure to plan around hay fever season or buy a face mask and take some antihistamines while you are there. This blog post was purely for fun on an interesting subject. It is also a good example of unintended consequences. If you are interested, please watch John Daub's video.
Source: John Daub -- Only in Japan
https://youtu.be/ctDXyw_cPsk