Food Allergies May Not Be as Bad as You Thought

Food Allergies May Not Be as Bad as You Thought pexels.com So while these are common allergens, this still doesn’t explain why there’s been an increase in people that become allergic to such foods. According to Dr. Virginia Stallings and her committee at the Nutrition Center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, “questions persist about whether food allergy prevalence has been on the rise within the past two decades and why. The current data do not unequivocally support the occurrence of such a rise.” In other words, the panel has no idea what’s going on, but they’re fairly certain that the rise in those with allergies is not due to science, but rather to a misunderstanding of what constitutes a food allergy. Which would make sense, especially considering the confusion surrounding “newer” allergies such as gluten allergies. Another important distinction to make is that there is actually a difference between an allergy and an intolerance. When foods upset your stomach, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you are allergic to them, but rather, that they upset your stomach or don’t “sit well.” Again, this isn’t necessarily an allergy. According to the panel, this is a common mistake, as symptoms can be mistaken for one another. The reaction to an intolerance wouldn’t be life threatening, but the reaction to an actual allergy would be. The panel advises the government on health and scientific matters, and they suggest that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention should be doing more to determine the commonness of food allergies to help interpret the rising numbers. In this request, they claimed, “no simple, accurate diagnostic test exists for food allergy.” So while there are definitive ways to test for other allergies such as dust and pollen food allergies aren’t really able to be tested. The panel said the following. “The patient’s medical history and other test results, such as from a skin prick test, can suggest the likelihood of a food allergy, but in some cases an oral food challenge which involves a gradual, medically supervised ingestion of increasingly larger doses of the food being tested as a possible allergen is needed to confirm diagnosis.” In other words, it’s an entire ordeal to get your food allergies accurately tested, so people typically just guess as to whether or not they are allergic to a certain food. Regardless of whether or not we are allergic to food, Americans worry about such things and take them seriously, which is another big reason that we need to begin developing an accurate test for them. According to the panel: “This committee had the unique opportunity to hear directly from an advisory panel made up of nine parents of children with food allergies and one individual with food allergy. We heard about the anxiety they feel in restaurants, schools, airplanes, and other settings where they are fearful about unintentional exposure to a food that can cause a life-threatening allergic reaction.” So how can we prevent allergies? That would appear to be the next logical step, right? Well, studies are now suggesting that this is a possibility. If children are given foods commonly associated with allergies earlier in life, this could possibly prevent allergies later on. However, there hasn’t been enough research done to test this theory, as it’s possible that younger children already have these allergies, in which case such exposure would be extremely dangerous. Plus, there’s no guarantee prior exposure will even prevent allergies, as there isn’t enough evidence to support this theory. So while we need to be aware of allergies, we also need to keep an eye out for more information, as there’s probably plenty we don’t even know.