This is not a substitute for an emergency inhaler or proper medical care, but I found it amazingly helpful.

I have always been a tea drinker and came across a vague recipe for 'ginger - milk tea.' I decided to give it a try. The ingredients were ginger root, water, looseleaf oolong tea leaves, milk and honey.

I bought ginger root at the grocery store. I didn't have an actual recipe, so I had to approximate it as best I could. What I did was, I cut about an inch to an inch and a half off the ginger root, peeled it, then sliced it like a carrot. I put it into a saucepan with about a quart or so of water and brought it to a boil. I let it boil for a minute, then turned it down and allowed it to simmer. After about 10 minutes I notice the water had changed color and look golden. I figured that was long enough.

Now I used that water to make tea. I used about a teaspoon of the oolong tea and steeped that in a cup of the ginger water. Then I added the milk and honey. After a couple of weeks, I noticed I wasn't using my inhaler as much. The only explanation was the tea - it was the only thing I was doing differently. (Previously I had gone through one inhaler a month, using it every 3-4 hours.)

I kept drinking the tea and eventually started to experiment with green tea instead of oolong tea, no milk, no honey, etc. I would even make the ginger water and keep it in the refrigerator to drink as a cold drink - basically a water substitute.

Now an inhaler lasts me a year! I later learned ginger is an anti-inflammatory.

I would suggest making the tea and drinking just as described (with the oolong tea, milk and honey) for at least a month or at least until you/they see a big difference in their inhaler use and breathing. And if you / they just hate the tea and can't drink it, there are ginger supplement pills and that might work just as well. I haven't used those though, so I can't say. Good luck and let me know if it helps. I hope it does.