Fall 2009

Protect Your Baby from Food Allergies

You can take steps, but there’s no proof that common tactics work

Food allergies have risen 18 percent among children and teens in the past decade, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). If allergy-based conditions of any kind run in your family—be it hay fever, eczema or asthma—your baby has an above-average chance of joining them.

What Can You Do?

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) believes you can take steps to help prevent food allergies. After reviewing studies, the AAP found evidence to support two strategies:

Breastfeed your baby if possible. Breastfeeding for at least four months can reduce the chance of developing asthma or cow’s milk allergy in babies with a family history of allergies. When breastfeeding is not an option, try a hypo-allergenic formula without cow milk protein.
Avoid giving your child solid foods until he or she is at least 4 months old. It’s not clear whether there’s any allergy-fighting benefit to waiting even longer.

Talk with your doctor to see if these strategies may help your child.

The AAP couldn’t find proof that several popular strategies prevent food allergies. For example, researchers couldn’t prove that mothers-to-be who avoid certain foods can protect infants from food allergies. Waiting until children are older to introduce them to eggs, peanut butter and other foods couldn’t be proven to help, either.

Why Are Food Allergies Rising?

One theory points to our obsession with germs. The more surfaces we clean with antibacterial wipes and the more hands we wash with antibacterial gel, the fewer germs there are for babies’ immune systems to fight. Idle armies get bored and turn their attention to nonhostile invaders—such as food. Allergic reactions happen when the body mistakes food as an enemy intruder.

Allergy—or Intolerance?

Despite the increase in food allergies, they still affect fewer than 4 percent of children and teens. Food intolerances are much more common.

What’s the difference? It’s all in how the body reacts to a particular food.

If the body responds to a food with a cascade of antibodies from the immune system, that’s a food allergy. In other words, your body reacts to a food the same way someone else’s body might react to a common allergen such as cat hair or ragweed.

If it’s your body’s digestive system that has trouble with a food, then you have a food intolerance. For example, many people are lactose-intolerant. Their digestive systems don’t produce enough lactase to help them absorb milk, so the result is cramps and diarrhea.