A report from the 106th International Conference of the American Thoracic Society (May 14-19, 2010 - New Orleans, Louisiana, USA).

Flowing oil covered the Gulf like a blanket, but while no attempts so far had been effective at controlling the oil spill, treatments that do work to improve symptoms, prevent disability and offer an improved quality of life were discussed during the meeting on respiratory tract diseases. Within the same context of pollution by human activity, it is interesting to know that retreatment with anacardic acids reduced lung inflammation upon exposure to diesel exhaust particles in experimental animals (Carvalho, A.L.N. et al., A1729), suggesting ways to improve human health. Along with pollution, which in New Orleans during the days of the meeting was largely washed away by the heavy rains, smoking remains a major health threat of specific interest for respiratory tract disease specialists. Although effective, well-tolerated treatments are available for smoking cessation in patients willing to quit, including, as reported during this year's ATS meeting in New Orleans, varenicline (Bolliger, C.T. et al., A2648; Tashkin, D.P. et al., A2858), smoking habits persist across cultures, countries, genders and geographical areas, and relapses are remarkably common even after successful pharmacological treatment (Ponnuswamy, A. et al., A2651). Effective smoking cessation certainly requires more than drugs, as the overall effectiveness has been shown to depend on the subjects' education level (Santos, S.R. et al., A2653), and psychobehavioral/cognitive interventions may help obtain successful outcomes. However, in addition to the already known but repeatedly confirmed negative impact of smoke on respiratory tract health, an interesting observation among this year's discussions was that use of olive oil throughout pregnancy results in a reduced likelihood for wheezing during the first year of life in the offspring (Castro-Rodriguez, J.A. et al., A1865) (an effect probably not dependent on the observed ability of oleanoic acid for preventing experimental acute lung injuries through inflammatory pathway modulation [Santos, R. et al., A2156]), whereas use of antibiotics during pregnancy was associated with an increased likelihood of wheezing in the offspring from the third year of age, peaking in the early school age and waning slowly up to young adulthood (Garcia-Marcos, L. et al., A4144). However, many other therapeutic issues of interest competed with all the attractions in New Orleans for the attention of congress attendees, and are briefly summarized in the following report.