Barf bags on airplanes: Are rates of airsickness declining?

Secondhand smoke also upsets my stomach, so I'd agree this could be a major factor. It's amazing to think smoking used to be so common in the confined plane cabin: every plane like those glass-encased "smoking areas" remaining in many airports!

Moderated drinking habits probably also play a role: when flying was rarer, and a rougher ride, throwing back excessive drinks before/during/between flights may have been a bigger part of the adventure – then also boosting airsickness rates.

Good point, apparently this is the case [1]. I had horrible car sickness as a child, on both trains and cars and I always thought I just grew out of it as I got older. A few weeks ago I was in the passenger seat of a heavy smoker's car and felt as sick as ever. Never realised the link.

[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/21036110/

Interesting. By the time I was born, all flights were non-smoking, so I've never ever seen anyone smoke on flights.

My wife has flown overseas every year to Europe (since she was a newborn) to visit family.

She got violently airsick every single flight and nobody could figure out why. Then when the international flights went non-smoking, the nausea stopped. She's 100% convinced it was the smoke. Even sitting in the "non-smoking area" got a constant wave of second-hand smoke that wafted around.

I'll second this as my own anecdotal experience.

I rate the primary cause to be cleaner and fresher air, perhaps about 90% of the problem solved. I'd say the last 10% is that airlines are smarter about dealing with turbulence.

Much better (more stable) auto pilots and flight management systems?

Indeed. The heaviest demand for bags I've ever seen was on a puddle jumper between Philadelphia and Washington, on a windy spring day.

>> "super effective drugs"

Any recommendations? I've 'grown out' of most of my motion sickness over the years but boats still get me bad. I can just about make 60 mins without being sick and then I feel awful for the next several hours. I've tried lots of stuff but most of it doesn't seem to help.

Maybe. Dimenhydrinate (Dramamine) has been around forever and is still one of the more effective things you can take. I sometimes use it in boats and it works pretty well though it makes me really drowsy. (I've never tried the patches.)

You definitely don't see the bags as much as you used to. I've noticed their absence myself. I suspect it has to do with generally bigger and more stable jets and better routing around turbulence. I do wonder though how much also had to do with the bags being one of the things airlines just stuck in the seatbacks out of long habit going back to the days when there were more props and small jets. Many airlines have cut back on a lot of stuff they used to routinely pass out like blankets and pillows.

I can't imagine that either.

What i can imagine is that time spend on cleaning a single barf spot probably exceeds the costs of paper bags. Then again, who says everybody managed to put everything neatly in the bags and no cleaning afterwards is required.

Need some proper stats to calculate this i guess.

I hadn't heard of the "AA olive" - https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-American-Airlines-save... gives the gist.