UK study reports the rate of food intolerance is not rising

Thursday, 21 February 2008 18:58

 A recent study funded by the UK Food Standards Agency, has reported that parents are far more likely to believe babies are allergic to some foods than they actually are.

 Dr Carina Venter of the University of Portsmouth studied nearly all the babies born in one year in the Isle of Wight. For every child who actually had a food allergy, at least three more were believed wrongly by their parents to suffer from the condition, according to researchers. The study also reported that food hypersensitivity had not increased since a previous study on the subject 20 years ago.

The study identified that parents were too quick to assume that their children had an allergy or intolerance to a specific food. It also showed that actual food hypersensitivity had not increased since a previous study on the subject 20 years ago.

The most common allergies observed during the study were to peanuts, eggs or milk.  By the age of three, about 75 per cent of the babies who were allergic to or intolerant of milk had outgrown their reaction, and half had outgrown their reaction to eggs. While more than a third of parents (272) said that their child was allergic or intolerant to one or more foods during the study involving 807 babies, fewer than 60 babies were found to be allergic to any food by the age of three.

The main reason that parents gave for thinking that their child was allergic to a food was their child having a rash, itching or developing hives or eczema.  A gastro-intestinal effect-including the child developing a tummy ache, vomiting, diarrhoea, constipation or colic-was reported to be the second largest reason for reporting an allergy. The third symptom highlighted by parents was a respiratory problem such as shortness of breath, asthma, wheeziness, a runny or itchy nose and coughing.

Milk, eggs, fruits (mainly strawberries and citrus fruit), tomato and its sauce, additives (colourings and preservatives), wheat, peanuts, fish, and soya were the food that were most commonly blamed by parents for causing a reaction.