Beginning shortly after the opening of the first complex in 1959, severe cases of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, chronic bronchitis, pulmonary emphysema, and bronchial asthma rose quickly among the local inhabitants, particularly in the Isozu and Shiohama districts which were closest to the factories, and among males over 50. Other chronic symptoms included sore throat. Symptoms showed some relief when sufferers left areas of high air pollution. By 1964, Isozu Village, which was most affected, had 2.5% of the population exhibiting symptoms. A 2008 study by researchers from the Mie University Graduate School of Medicine and the Hiroshima University Natural Science Center for Basic Research and Development indicated a 10- to 20-fold higher mortality rate as a result of COPD and asthma in the affected populations of<unk>  versus the general population of Mie Prefecture. Several asthma victims committed suicide, such as Kihira Usaburou, with some writing suicide notes attributing their deaths to the disease. For one 40-year-old<unk>  sufferer reported in Respiratory Medicine Case Reports journal, Symptoms showed relief when treated using a vibrating mesh nebulizer.
Yokkaichi asthma
Thunderstorm asthma
Brittle asthma
Cardiac asthma
Nonallergic rhinitis
Croup
Katrina cough
Whooping cough