Food Allergy Awareness Week
Posted on 17 May 2010 by LynThomas in Health
May 16-20 is Food Allergy Awareness Week, aiming to make people more aware of food allergies and offer support to those at risk of anaphylixis, (extreme reaction).
The Australian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergies says that food allergies occur in around 1 in 20 children and about 1 in 100 adults. Most child food allergies are expected to disappear with time.
Hospital admissions for severe allergic reactions (anaphylaxis) have doubled over the last decade in Australia, USA and UK and the general feeling is that food allergies are on the rise.
Reactions to food allergies are influenced by a number of things:
- Amount eaten
- Severity of the allergy
- Whether it is eaten on its own or mixed in with other foods
- Form of the food (liquid may sometimes be absorbed faster)
- Exercise around the same time as the meal may worsen severity.
- Presence or absence of asthma
- Cooked food is sometimes better tolerated
Food allergy is an overreaction of the body’s immune system, usually to a protein.
The symptoms of food allergy can be life threatening and include:
- Itching, burning and swelling around the mouth
- Runny nose
- Skin rash (eczema)
- Hives (urticaria – skin becomes red and raised)
- Diarrhoea, abdominal cramps
- Breathing difficulties, including wheezing and asthma
- Vomiting, nausea.
Nuts, eggs, milk or soy cause about 90 per cent of food allergies. Peanut allergy is one of the most common allergies in older children. Seafood and some fruit and berries can also cause an allergic reaction, including MSG and sulphite derivatives.
According to a new report commissioned by the American federal government, the true number of food allergic sufferers hovers around eight percent for children and five percent for adults.
“Everyone has a different definition of a food allergy,” said Dr. Jennifer J. Schneider Chafen, who was the lead author of the new report. “Many people have food intolerance instead.”
Food intolerance, which is much more common than food allergy, is a chemical reaction to a particular ingredient, or food. This is not an immune response.
Symptoms of food intolerance can include:
- Nervousness, tremor
- Sweating
- Palpitations
- Rapid breathing
- Headache, migraine
- Diarrhoea
- Burning sensations on the skin
- Tightness across the face and chest
- Breathing problems – asthma-like symptoms
- Allergy-like reactions.
The foods that tend to cause intolerance reactions in sensitive people include dairy products, chocolate, egg, MSG, pepper, red wine, histamine and amines in food.
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17 May 2010
[...] Find out the difference between food allergy and food intolerance… [...]
Most allergies can be treated by corticosteroids and also some antihistamine blockers.~,’
i really hated eczema because it does not look good and it is sometimes very itchy’`’
asthma simply sucks! i suffer from it for several years already:;*
asthma can really choke me when it attacks, ,’~
my girlfriend got eczema and this is a nasty and itchy skin disease;.,
sometimes i suffer asthma attacks and i really hate this disease “
eczema infected skin are not very good looking at all and they are quite annoying ”
allergies can be a menacing sickness specially if you get stuffy nose and rashes all overy your body each day -”:
Hi, I have a 12 year old whom has been dairy and gluten intolerant, leaving nasty rashes, stomach cramps and Diarrhoea.
and rashes through her scalp, sore and embarrasing. We have found something that really has worked for us, so I am reaching out and telling people about this. Neuro Linguistic programming.(NLP)
I- her Mum- Leticia has been working on my girl and we have had fantastic results. She no longer has the rashes, her symptoms are going and we only did the simple process three weeks ago. Works for us and I have heard maNY a good thing about this. So much so I am now a practitioner! Check it out, it’s worth it, as you may have the rest of your life with symptoms, so why wouldnt you want to try to do something about it!
Thanks for sharing that with us Leticia.
I too know how annoying and confining food allergies can be. Mine is pepper, philadephia cheese and msg.
i am an asthma sufferer for years and there seems to be no cure for it. you can only control the sypmtoms;
Thanks for the great info.