The current (February 7th) issue of the New Yorker has an interesting piece by Jerome Groopman, the talented New Yorker staff writer who covers health and medical issues for the magazine. Entitled “The Peanut Puzzle,” the article ponders a question currently vexing the medical community (and many parents): why are food allergies, including peanut allergies, so clearly on the rise — and what can be done to prevent them?
The article describes the work of Dr. Gideon Lack, one of the first doctors to challenge the prevailing advice that children be kept from commonly allergenic foods (peanuts, etc.) until their immune systems can fully develop. It also examines various theories about the cause of food allergies, including the “hygiene hypothesis” (i.e., our children’s environments are too sterile) and the theory that vitamin D may play a role (doctors in cold states write three to four times as many prescriptions for epinephrine than doctors in warm states). Dr. Lack also mentions something I’ve never heard before: in developing countries (where allergies are less common), food is often pre-chewed by a parent before being fed to an infant, leading to the speculation that the enzymes and antibodies in the parent’s saliva might naturally prevent an allergenic response. I found that fascinating.
Unless you’re a New Yorker subscriber, the link above will only take you to an abstract of the piece, not the full article. However, if you’re among the many Lunch Tray readers with children affected by food allergies, you may want to stop by the newsstand and pick up this issue.
On a related note, in the coming days I’ll have a guest blog post from my new friend Robyn McCord O’Brien, founder of the Allergy Kids Foundation and author of The Unhealthy Truth.
Viki says
Thanks for the heads up. I’ll go look up the magazine.