Kids traipse in and out her office for puffs on their inhalers. She wonders aloud to a visitor about asthma's rise. Maybe, she says, all the construction is to blame. More than 750 homes are expected to sprout from former citrus groves in the next few years. But that can't be it, she counters.
Building goes on everywhere.
Leon scans a roster of kids enrolled in an asthma-education class. Smoking magnifies asthma symptoms. Half the kids in the class had someone in the house who smokes. But, she continues, smoking is down from past decades. Leon and Mendez, doctors and researchers, just don't know what has caused the area's asthma explosion.