I'm not going to sit here and pretend to be an asthma expert, but having had it since I was a child, I can speak of my own personal experience.
I have asthma. I've had it for 25 years. I use an inhaler in emergency situations only, but I always have one on me. I have a nebulizer in my bedroom with my liquid albuterol ready to go in case I ever need it.
Now for the interesting part. As a child, I used an inhaler nearly every day. I used my nebulizer a few times each month. In the past 10 years, I have gotten down to only needing my inhaler once or twice each month if that, and I have only used the nebulizer twice.
There are a few factors that have changed in that 10 year span.....
1. There are roughly 95,000 more people living in here in Virginia Beach. More people equals more cars. More cars equals more air quality problems.
2. There have been several smog warnings each year, something that was unheard of 10 years ago in this area when we had been rated among the top 10 cities in the world with the cleanest air.
3. There have been 3 massive dismal swamp fires that filled the air here with thick brown smoke for days on end, the last time lasting for over 2 months before it cleared up.
4. I started smoking - obviously a stupid decision for an asthmatic.
So, with all of this air quality getting worse and being a trigger, I have experienced several major triggers over the past decade, yet my asthma has nearly gone away.
Now granted, that's not the same as inhaling coal dust obviously, but I call BS on any report that claims the main trigger of asthma is in the air, because it can't possibly be true. I find it hard to believe that I am the exception rather than the rule.
Coal might be a different issue altogether, but the fact is, any pulmonary doctor will tell you they have absolutely no clue what causes or triggers asthma, because everybody is different.
For the record, I am anti coal, anti wind farm and anti solar energy. I'm a natural gas, oil and nuclear energy fan.