The New York Times – For decades, as food allergy rates climbed, experts recommended that parents avoid exposing their infants to common allergens.
But a landmark trial in 2015 found that feeding peanuts to babies could cut their chances of developing an allergy by over 80 percent.
In 2017, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases formally recommended the early-introduction approach and issued national guidelines.
The new study, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, found that food allergy rates in children under 3 fell after those guidelines were put into place — dropping to 0.93 percent between 2017 and 2020, from 1.46 percent between 2012 and 2015.
That’s a 36 percent reduction in all food allergies, driven largely by a 43 percent drop in peanut allergies.
The study also found that eggs overtook peanuts as the No. 1 food allergen in young children.
The study did not examine what infants ate, so it does not show that the guidelines caused the decline. Still, the data is promising. While all food allergies can be dangerous, 80 percent of people never outgrow one.
“We’re talking about the prevention of a potentially deadly, life-changing diagnosis,” said Dr. Edith Bracho-Sanchez, a pediatrician at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York, who was not involved with the study.
“This is real world data of how a public health recommendation can change children’s health.”
Scientists don’t fully understand what causes food allergies, but some believe that higher rates of C-section deliveries, early childhood exposure to antibiotics and our increasingly sanitized environments may play a role, said Jeanna Ryan, a physician assistant at University of Utah Health.
However, scientists have a working picture of how allergies might develop. Allergens first encountered through the skin — especially broken or inflamed skin — can prompt the immune system to mistake them for threats, said Dr. David Hill …
