Kronzer VL, et al. - Via a case-control study of 1,023 subjects of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) (175 incident) within a single-center biobank population, the researchers assessed the association between RA and asthma, passive smoke exposure, and age at the beginning of smoking. Asthma was seen to be affiliated with RA in the full cohort and not the incident RA cohort, post-adjustment for allergies, urban environment, and passive smoke exposure. In both, the full cohort and the incident RA cohort, a history of allergic disease was connected to RA particularly food allergy, which was markedly linked to RA in the full cohort and exhibited a trend toward significance in the incident RA cohort. No correlation between passive smoke exposure at home or work and RA was recognized. At last, age at the beginning of smoking was not related to progressed odds of developing RA in either of the cohorts. Hence, there is a possibility that asthma and allergies could be associated with an enhanced risk of RA. However, passive smoke exposure and early age at the beginning of smoking did not seem to influence the risk of RA.