Cedar pollen levels may be 10 times higher than last year in Tokyo, experts warn.

If you're allergic to pollen, grab your handkerchiefs and head for the shops.

Health experts predict this year will set records for extremes of cedar pollen, spreading allergy havoc across the nation, perhaps as early as around mid-February.

Stores are girding for an expected onslaught in demand for anti-allergy products.

Last summer's record-breaking heat wave is to blame for climbing pollen levels, experts say. High temperatures stimulated cedar and cypress trees to produce more floral buds-which will soon begin spewing pollen.

In Tokyo, people are already donning filtering masks to deal with the city's highest-ever expected pollen count.

Shoppers are also checking out displays of anti-allergy products at department stores.

According to Pollen Information Association, a nongovernmental group, the air in Tokyo this year could see 2 to 2.5 times more airborne pollen than average. It may even climb to about 10 times more than last year, when the pollen count was low.

``People should take special care during the weeks when the haru ichiban (spring's first) gales are blowing,'' said Norio Sahashi, chief director of the association. He recommends masks and hay fever medicines to deal with attacks caused by inhaling large amounts of pollen.

The Tokyo metropolitan government announced in late January that estimated average cedar and cypress pollen counts at nine locations in the region could be 21 to 31 times higher than last year.

The figures could top the highest levels recorded since the government started keeping track in 1985, they added.

Department stores set up sections devoted to hay fever merchandise much earlier than usual.

Odakyu's Shinjuku branch, which typically adds anti-allergy product displays in January, started nearly a month earlier. The store will offer about 300 items to prevent or provide relief from allergy symptoms in March-the peak season-including 30 kinds of masks.

Nasal irrigation kits priced at 10,000 yen are selling well, staff say, and total sales of allergy products are already 10 times higher than in the same month last year.

``We've been getting questions (about allergy prevention items) since November. Customers are already taking action,'' said an Odakyu spokesman.

At the Nihonbashi and Shinjuku branches of Takashimaya department store, all allergy-fighting products are now in one display, instead of being spread across different floors.

About 100 kinds of items, from pollen-repelling bedclothes and air purifiers to nose masks, are for sale.

At some Mitsukoshi department stores, pollen-repellent women's hats (6,825 yen) and knee-length jackets (12,600 yen) are available.

The ``Anchiporan'' (anti-pollen) fabric is supposed to prevent pollen from sticking. The improved fabrics are softer this year and available in a wider range of colors. Staff predict sales will more than double.

Many hay fever sufferers are also checking out Chinese herbal medicines that they hope will improve their overall physical condition and lessen pollen reactions.

Dojindo, a Chinese herbal drugstore at Seibu department store in Tokyo's Ikebukuro district, says customers, mainly young women, have been asking for advice since late December.

The shop has already sold nearly three times as many sets of Eieki-karyu (8,400 yen), three kinds of Chinese granulated herbs that are reputed to strengthen the mucous membranes, as it had by the same date last year.

And at the Nihondo Kampo Boutique, a Chinese herb store in the Shinjuku branch of Keio department store, hay fever sufferers started asking about remedies in December.

Allergy sufferers looking for effective Chinese herbal remedies are concerned about the side-effects of doctor-prescribed medicines that make them sleepy, a Nihondo staffer said.(IHT/Asahi: February 8,2005)