Asthma & Allergies: Can Pregnant Moms Give Their Babies A Peanut Allergy? Maybe
By Alice Park | @aliceparkny | November 1, 2010 | + Tweet
Around six percent of children under the age of three suffer from food allergies, and close to 2% are allergic to peanuts. And as the proportion of affected young continues to grow, researchers and concerned parents have tried to pinpoint the source of the rising numbers. How early does sensitivity to foods begin? Could it start as early as during pregnancy, with the foods an unborn child is exposed to in the womb? According to a new study led by Dr. Scott Sicherer at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, that's a strong possibility. Sicherer found that among 503 infants who showed signs of milk and egg allergy between the ages of three to 15 months, those whose mothers ate peanuts more than twice a week while they were pregnant had higher levels of antibodies to peanuts than those whose mothers ate peanuts less often. The group focused on babies reacting to milk and eggs because they are more prone to developing reactions to peanuts as well. Sicherer notes that higher levels of the antibody do not necessarily mean that the babies will definitely become allergic to peanuts Christian Louboutin Sneakers, but it is a strong indicator that they could be at higher risk of developing food allergies. (More on Time.com: 5 Pregnancy Taboos Explained (or Debunked))
The results are only the latest in a confusing and conflicting set of studies that still leave open the important question of whether a pregnant mother should alter her diet to reduce the risk that her child will develop a food allergy. "Parents wonder, are they eating too many peanuts and giving their child a peanut allergy, or are they not eating enough peanuts and should have eaten more to expose their child," says Sicherer. "No mother should be on a guilt trip over this." Even the American Academy of Pediatrics has flip-flopped on its advice to moms-to-be. Between 1998-2000, pediatric experts advised women with a family history of food allergies to avoid strongly allergenic foods such as peanuts during pregnancy to reduce the risk that their unborn child would become sensitized to the food. At the time, there was evidence that in utero exposure might contribute to a pre-programmed reaction by the still-developing fetal immune system to peanut proteins that could lead to an allergic reaction after birth. But in 2008, after several smaller studies in England found that such a policy did not seem to affect rates of peanut allergy among newborns, the academy withdrew this recommendation, instead warning women that the scientific data wasn't strong enough for them to change their diet in any way to avoid potential food allergies. (More on Time.com: Video: Embryo Adoption Techniques Improve Chances for Pregnancy)
"The next question parents can ask is, 'Are these results enough to change the recommendation that mothers should not worry about eating peanuts during pregnancy' and the answer is no," says Sicherer. His group will continue to follow the infants to determine how many actually go on to develop a peanut allergy, in order to learn more about how such abnormal immune reactions to foods are triggered, and some studies hint that newborns being exposed to increasingly sterile environments leads their organs to react more violently to any "foreign" proteins, including those from food, under the mistaken impression that these substances are harmful and toxic. Therefore, teams at Mount Sinai and elsewhere are investigating whether early exposure to such potentially food-allergenic agents can tolerize infants to them and prevent an allergic reaction. There is evidence that this may work, since a group at Duke has reported success in gradually exposing peanut-allergic youngsters to increasing amounts of peanuts as a way to treat their allergy. "I don't think we have enough evidence to tell families to do something different than what they are already doing," he says Nike Air Max 90 Shoes, "but the study shows that perhaps we should consider in utero exposure as a potential risk factor and study it further prospectively."
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