ABSTRACT
While overwhelming evidence links asthma to respiratory infections, it seems strange based on superficial evaluation that both the inception and the natural history of asthma may be affected by infections not directly involving the respiratory tract. Umberto Serafini pioneered this concept in 1950. He described five patients with asthma whose clinical manifestations disappeared with the onset of hepatitis and were absent for the duration of the disease; in one patient, a decrease in blood eosinophils was also recorded.
