Peanut allergies cut by early exposure
A new study shows that early exposure to peanut products significantly decreases the risk of developing peanut allergies later in childhood. The King’s College London study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that exposing infants to peanut products before their first birthday cut the incidence of allergy by over 80 percent.
The number of children in Western countries with peanut allergies has doubled in the last ten years; in the United States, the incidence is four times higher than it was in 2008. But researchers noticed a curious thing: Israeli children had appreciably lower rates of peanut sensitivity than Jewish children in Britain or the U.S.
The reason, it appears, is the ubiquity of a popular snack food called Bamba, a peanut butter-flavored corn puff that makes up a quarter of Israeli snack sales. Bamba is reportedly even more common as a digestible pacifier for young Israeli kids than baggies of Cheerios are in certain segments of the U.S.
Based on this observation, a randomized group of 640 infants who were determined predisposed to peanut allergies were fed diets that either completely avoided peanut products or included the gradual introduction of peanut soup, peanut butter and, yes, Bamba before the children turned one. The kids were then followed for five years.
The results were dramatic. Of those infants that avoided peanuts, 17 percent went on to develop peanut allergies, but only 3.2 percent of the kids that were exposed to peanuts had similar problems. Even in children who had already begun to show signs of peanut sensitivity, a diet that included some peanut products reduced allergy rates from 35 percent to 11 percent.
Lead researcher Gideon Lack told the BBC this “represents a real shift” in the way we think about peanut allergies, and could augur a change in the way childhood allergies are approached, in general.
It also begins to shine a light on the mystery behind the rapid rise in peanut allergies in recent decades. While likely not the only factor, a story unfolds of increased awareness of some allergy cases leading to an increased number of children raised without exposure to peanuts, which, in turn, produced an increase in the number of kids sensitive to peanuts. And that, in turn, multiplied the problem again.
As an editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine states, the results are "so compelling and the problem of the increasing prevalence of peanut allergy so alarming, new guidelines should be forthcoming very soon."
The news, of course, comes with a number of caveats. Parents should always consult a physician before making a change like this in a child’s food intake. Families with predispositions to allergies should have children tested before introducing peanuts into the diet, and in some cases, peanut products should first be eaten in the presence of a doctor. And Children under 5 should not be given whole peanuts, as they pose a choking hazard.
Also yet unanswered, whether kids need to continue to eat peanut products to maintain a tolerance. Lack, the lead researcher, says he plans to continue to follow children to measure what happens to those that stop the regular consumption of peanuts.
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