Coughing up phlegm and not being able to breathe means coughing up phlegm with dyspnea, which may be caused by pneumonia, airway foreign bodies and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. 1. Pneumonia: Pneumonia patients will have cough and sputum symptoms due to alveolar capillary congestion, edema and inflammatory cell infiltration caused by pathogen infection. If the scope of lesions is large, it can affect lung function and manifest as dyspnea. 2. Airway foreign body: Airway foreign body can irritate the trachea or bronchus, leading to irritating choking cough. If there are airway secretions, there are symptoms such as coughing up sputum. If the airway foreign body is large and obstructs the airway, symptoms such as dyspnea may occur. 3. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD): patients usually have different degrees of chronic cough, cough and sputum symptoms, such as lung function decline, there will be wheezing symptoms, and in severe cases, there can be respiratory failure. In addition, there are other reasons that can cause coughing with sputum on the symptoms of not coming up for air, such as asthma, lung tumors, tuberculosis, pulmonary fibrosis, etc., such as the symptoms have not improved or aggravated, it is recommended to go to the hospital in a timely manner, to clarify the cause of the disease, and under the guidance of the doctor for reasonable treatment.