Plenty of people argue that the increase in California asthma rates has nothing to do with air quality. Air has actually gotten cleaner, they say. There are many causes for asthma, including poor indoor air quality.

Medical experts argued the other side Thursday. They analyzed hospitalization rates and found that polluted places, such as the Los Angeles basin, are the hardest on people with sensitive lungs.

The risk of getting asthma while living in a polluted air basin is getting worse, they said.

These bits of information are not new, but the experts repeated them for a Senate Select Committee on Public Health and the Environment in Sacramento:

-- California's childhood astha rates are the highest in the San Joaquin Valley.

-- There is a higher incidence of asthma in people who live near freeways.

-- Children who play sports and live in a bad-air basin are three times morel likely to get asthma than children who live in clean-air basins.