Nuts are the nuts that cause the most allergy to children
The food allergy It is one of the health problems that most concern parents. Sometimes, many edible products contain traces of the food that produces allergies to our children, such as nuts, and children can be in serious danger.
Specifically, one of the main conclusions reached by the Pronuts Study, a research conducted in the United Kingdom, Switzerland and Spain and presented at the Congress of the Spanish Society of Clinical Immunology, Allergy and Pediatric Asthma (SEICAP), is that nuts are the nuts that most frequently cause food allergies in children and are associated with more severe reactions, demonstrated in provocation tests, carried out in the hospital.
Milk, eggs and nuts: allergens
Allergies to food are among the most common among children. Thus, in children under two years, the food allergy that manifests most often is milk and eggs. "However, from that age, they are nuts, and these are also the foods that cause more anaphylaxis," says Dr. Ángel Mazón, member of the SEICAP. In fact, allergies to these products have emerged exponentially in the last years of the 20th century. "The frequency of other nuts other than peanuts as causes of anaphylaxis has increased by 373% from 2005 to 2014 in the United States," says Dr. Mazón.
Often, an allergy to a specific nut It is associated with allergy to another or other fruits dry. Thus, pediatricians allergists sometimes recommend the withdrawal of all of them, regardless of whether it is the allergen or not. "To prevent reactions due to errors or cross-contamination, it is safest to avoid all similar foods, in this case nuts, but this is a decision that can affect the quality of life of patients, as well as complicate their feeding based on their habits, "says Dr. Mazón.
Allergy to a nut, withdrawal of all
"In cases of cross-reactivity, allergy or sensitization to more than one nut it is due to similar molecular components among them. But the allergy to more than one nut may occur by coincidence at random, as occurs when the allergy to a dried fruit coincides with an allergy to another different food, such as seafood or fish, "explains this member of the SEICAP .
Internationally, peanuts are responsible for most allergies. This is due, above all, to information from countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom or Australia, where the consumption of these nuts prevails. But, in fact, there have been variations in the prevalence of sensitization or allergy according to the country of study. "You can not make generalizations.
In the United Kingdom, for example, it is these nuts - peanuts - that show the most frequency of allergy, specifically 1% of the pediatric population, compared to the 0.5% that they have obtained from the set of other nuts "Dr. Mazón points out:" In the case of Switzerland, pistachios are the most common. "Although the Pronuts Study has not specifically analyzed the causes of these differences between Spain, the United Kingdom or Switzerland, "It is believed that genetic and cultural factors can influence in relation to the types of food we use in each country, as well as the age at which they are introduced," says the doctor.
Marisol Nuevo Espín
Advice: doctor Angel Mazón, member of SEICAP
