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Study: Peanut Consumption In Infancy Helps Prevent Peanut Allergy
Mr D from 63 writes:
According to a report from the Associated Press, "For years, parents of babies who seem likely to develop a peanut allergy have gone to extremes to keep them away from peanut-based foods. Now a major study suggests that is exactly the wrong thing to do. Here's the published paper in the New England Journal of Medicine. It's interesting how this peanut allergy fear is a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The situation involves a complete misconception of risk by many parents, and probably it doesn't stop at peanuts. Is there a bigger underlying problem here?
underlying problem.
Were nut allergies always so high and just not reported or is this a more recent development?
I ask because 30-40 years ago this didn't seem as widespread?
My mom ate a lot of peanuts when I was a few months old, and I almost died of peanut allergy. I question this result.
55 years later, I'm still deathly allergic to them. It does add some adventure to life.
I love Mondays. On a Monday, anything is possible.
when she was only about six months old.
She loved it, I had never heard you weren't supposed to give it to babies, and now that she's 12 she still likes it. I can can get on-board with this theory.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Doctors are telling us to keep our children away from peanuts, eggs, and various other foods until two years of age. Then we're supposed to introduce them one at a time, with a few weeks between to monitor results & possible outbreaks. Even if no one in the family has any such allergies.
I'm sure it's not just me, almost every friend across the US with kids in our approximate age range have talked about the same things. I wonder if the people who write this stuff are paying attention...
There are several studies that show early exposure is associated with an increased risk and also several that show early exposure gives a decreased risk. Is this just another study that agrees with some and disagrees with others or is it just some reporter that doesn't have a clue posting something sensational?
Schools seem to have stopped pushing education, but push agendas instead. One of those agendas is encouraging those who have a problem to impose it on others, even when there's treatment available (The treatment has been known for over a decade, unsurprisingly, it's to feed the kids ever increasing incredibly tiny doses of peanuts until they no longer react unless fed entire peanuts). One of the results of this is peanut bans in schools (often replaced with items that, rather than providing nutrition, are just candy, such as Nutella).
So responsibly exposing kids to risks early in life helps them deal with those same risks later on? Who would have thought ...
Back in 2007, Anderson Cooper asked a pediatrician if PlumpyNut (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plumpy%27nut) was affecting people in developing countries suffering from malnutrition with peanut allergies. The Dr. said "We just don't see it. In developing countries food allergy is not nearly the problem that it is in industrialized countries." Sounds like this study backs up that claim.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/a-...
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
Ditto.
She's 23 and going strong.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Honey can contain clostridium botulinum spores which are fatally toxic to babies (the spores are harmless to adults). Not giving babies honey is less a case of "it might cause some side effects later in life" and more a case of "it might kill them tomorrow".
Honey is different as it can cause botulism poisoning in infants. It's not an allergen, but rather often harbors an actual amount of bacteria. In adults and children, the bacteria load is not harmful as the body can easily deal with it. In infants, the body reacts differently to botulism and it can occasionally kill them.
http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/bacterial_viral/botulism.html
That's why you were given the butt chewing. It's a very different situation to peanuts. Peanuts would be unsafe if they were covered in the same bacteria that honey harbors.
Actually there IS some justification on holding off on honey until 12 months, floppy baby syndrome is a real thing. Not saying you did anything wrong, but that's one that does have some scientific reasoning behind it (not just some 'I read it on Natural News blog' kind of pseudoscience)
http://pediatric-medical.blogs...
'The unexamined life is not worth living' - Socrates
"SUNDAY, Feb. 22, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- A wearable patch that safely and gradually exposes the body to small amounts of peanut allergen appears effective in easing the allergy, an early new study shows."
http://health.usnews.com/healt...
...omphaloskepsis often...
This has nothing to do with allergies. You don't feed babies honey to avoid the very rare cases where it actually causes immediate problems. After a year it is perfectly fine.
It's like some of the things that are excluded while being pregnant (cats, game meat,...), just a precaution for the possible rare, but severe consequences of an unwanted contamination.
what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.....
Guys, the honey-botulism thing is like eggs-salmonella. Not every egg has salmonella, and if you eat the clean ones raw, you'll be fine. Not all honey has C.Botulinum spores (which cause it), but if you give some that is contaminated to a young child, they will be badly affected because their gut bacteria hasn't had time to develop--it's a matter of growth, not resistance through exposure. You played the odds and won. Most kids that eat honey will be fine and most batches aren't contaminated. Some of them will get a bad batch and will be less fortunate.
ok so how many infants were SAVED by inoculation after they were BORN?!?
This is NOT the same thing. In fact, it's closer to the exact opposite. Infants are born with still-developing immune systems, and honey contains botulism spores which are capable of germinating in subjects with weak or still-developing immune systems. This is a proven risk that presents itself *every time* an infant eats honey, and there's a ton of downside if the risk is realized. On the other side of the coin, there's absolutely no upside to feeding an infant honey while their immune system is still developing the ability attack these spores.
A severe peanut allergy, on the other hand, is more likely to present itself during the very first exposure, and it also worsens gradually if it doesn't create a severe reaction on the first exposure. Also, as stated in this article, early exposure to peanuts has the upside of lowering the risk of a severe allergy later in life. Please don't conflate shit just because it makes you feel like a better parent.
I had heard of that. Noted that honey jars have warnings about not giving honey to babies under one year old
Well, the thing they were tying to avoid is called "infant botulism".
It's very rare, but getting it is as bad as the name sounds. You'd be talking about time in the ICU to cure this...
They talk about a certain bacteria found in honey. Anybody but infants can handle ingesting this bacteria.
Thinking of my nephew. He used to eat a lot of peanuts, then - as a teenager - he ramped that up and pretty much overdosed.
He is in his mid 20's now and allergic to them. Too much of a good thing and all that.
Mielipiteet omiani - Opinions personal, facts suspect.
Sounds like honey could be a prime candidate for irradiation.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
The advice against feeding honey to babies is not because of allergies, but because there is an -- admittedly small -- risk of it being contaminated. A baby's immune system isn't sufficiently mature yet, and this type of infection is potentially fatal.
So, yes, most parents are probably not going to notice anything bad about giving honey to their little ones. But as there is no particular unique benefit to eating honey, even the minor risk is worthwhile avoiding. This is the same reason, why pregnant women are advised against eating fresh cheese and raw fish. The risk is small, as evidenced by Japanese women eating sushi during pregnancy. But there still is a minor risk for an infection that could prove fatal to the unborn. Why take chances, if there are so many other alternative foods. And it is only for a couple of months anyway.
This is all very different from allergens. While allergies are not fully understood, there does appear to be some evidence that early exposure to allergens can reduce the statistical likelihood of developing allergies later in life. This must be traded off with the risk that allergic reactions can happen unexpectedly (i.e. somebody suddenly becomes allergic to something they previously didn't have problems with) and food allergies can easily be so severe that they are life threatening.
I never bought into the theory that avoiding peanuts for infants somehow helped them avoid developing allergies. So, these newer findings don't surprise me much. But I did buy into the precaution of avoiding peanuts for really young children, as a possible allergic reaction would almost certainly put them at increased risk of dying from anaphylactic shock.
The conclusion for us was: no raw fish during pregnancy, no raw honey or peanuts during the first year of life, but no additional restrictions after these times. We still carefully watch the kids, when they eat nuts, though -- just in case. And we generally encourage a diverse diet, always asking the kids to try new things.
Honey is different as it can cause botulism poisoning in infants. It's not an allergen, but rather often harbors an actual amount of bacteria. In adults and children, the bacteria load is not harmful as the body can easily deal with it. In infants, the body reacts differently to botulism and it can occasionally kill them.
http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/bacterial_viral/botulism.html
That's why you were given the butt chewing. It's a very different situation to peanuts. Peanuts would be unsafe if they were covered in the same bacteria that honey harbors.
If I had mod points, I'd vote you up. My son is five months old, cutting his first teeth, and getting his first taste of real food. The pediatricians stressed the dangers of bacteria which may be present in some batches of uncooked honey. They also say to hold off on cow's milk until a year old for different reasons.
Irradiation isn't 100% at inactivating C.Botulinum. Neither is heat pasteurization (to the level that your honey is still, well, honey). There's no guaranteed safe way of making honey edible for infants.
This is the reason all honey containers have a warning printed on them, saying "Don't Feed to Kids Under 1 Year Old." I guess pecosdave didn't read the label.
Honey is very close to pure sugar, anyway. It provides energy, but not a lot of building materials for the infant body. There's no good reason to feed it to infants.
Doctors are telling us to keep our children away from peanuts, eggs, and various other foods until two years of age. Then we're supposed to introduce them one at a time, with a few weeks between to monitor results & possible outbreaks. Even if no one in the family has any such allergies.
I'm sure it's not just me, almost every friend across the US with kids in our approximate age range have talked about the same things. I wonder if the people who write this stuff are paying attention...
I have a five month old son, so I've been paying attention to this kind of thing. I've noticed that doctors' recommendations change every few years. My mom's generation was told to introduce rice cereal at six weeks, but now the recommendation is to start at about 6 months. We were also told to introduce at most one new food every three days so that if an allergy is discovered it would be easier to identify the cause.
Here is an exert from a 2008 statement from the AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics) :
Although solid foods should not be introduced before 4 to 6 months of age, there is no current convincing evidence that delaying their introduction beyond this period has a significant protective effect on the development of atopic disease regardless of whether infants are fed cow milk protein formula or human milk. This includes delaying the introduction of foods that are considered to be highly allergic, such as fish, eggs, and foods containing peanut protein.(View Report)
Most sources say to hold off until 8 months before introducing eggs and 12 months before introducing peanut butter. Of course this guideline will vary if family member is known to have allergies for a given food.
There is also no guaranteed safe way of doing ANYTHING, and I suspect you know that! So stop being an idiot.
I assume that you well know that honey is most certainly not the ONLY place children can be exposed to C.Botulinum, or are you going to try and claim that?
Please, feel free to try and lock children up in a plastic bubble - and see just how well that works out for you.
The rest of us will continue with letting kids grow up the way kids have grown up for a long time, which is being exposed to a wide range of
environments and therefore the nasties that exist there... And I am pretty damn sure whos kids will end up stronger, happier, and more well adjusted
members of society.
If you plan to keep your kids away from Honey because of this, I assume you have NEVER driven them in a car, have nothing in your house that is
smaller than a box of matches (to avoid choking), nothing climbable, never EVER let them play outside (you want the full list of what exists in normal
dirt?) or go in the sun (Skin Cancer!), etc, etc, etc.
LIFE is RISK, avoid it all, and, well..... avoid life.
Well, that and the fact that it is actively unhealthy to avoid all such exposure.
Honey is different as it can cause botulism poisoning in infants. It's not an allergen, but rather often harbors an actual amount of bacteria. In adults and children, the bacteria load is not harmful as the body can easily deal with it. In infants, the body reacts differently to botulism and it can occasionally kill them.
http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/bacterial_viral/botulism.html
That's why you were given the butt chewing. It's a very different situation to peanuts. Peanuts would be unsafe if they were covered in the same bacteria that honey harbors.
If I had mod points, I'd vote you up. My son is five months old, cutting his first teeth, and getting his first taste of real food. The pediatricians stressed the dangers of bacteria which may be present in some batches of uncooked honey. They also say to hold off on cow's milk until a year old for different reasons.
Boob juice. Srsly. Until they are a year (later, even better) they should be drinking as much of it as they can get. Don't cheap out and feed them $3/gal boiled cow runoff. Not for a long time.
.. so North American Nature is Very Different from European.. and everyone who is not "american indian" potentially has problem
The bigger question is . . .
How long is it going to be until there is a mandatory "nut allergy vaccine" in the form of a required patch / injection of peanut dust in order to allow nut-allergic children to go to school?
If nut-allergies are shown to be preventable in the same way as measles, etc., why should a school have to be completely on edge about a child going into shock because some other child brought a sandwich to lunch? The economic benefits alone of doing away with the nonsense of nut separation in snacks, parties, cafeteria choices, medical equipment on-hand, etc. would pay for making this part of the immunization package for kindergarten entry.
Isn't it a form of child abuse to allow your child to live with a curable allergy that could kill them in a moment's notice?
There's a popular snack in Israel called Bamba, which consists of puffed corn coated with peanut butter.
Pretty much everyone eats it, and it's pretty common for parents to feed it to children as soon as they can handle solid food.
So I was wondering how that affects the allergy rate for Israelis.
And apparently a study shows that when comparing Israelis to UK Jews of a similar background, the Israelis had a tenth of the peanut allergy rate compared to the UK group.
Doctors bad-mouth cow's milk because a bunch of vegan pussies with their hippie propaganda have convinced a gullible bunch of half-a-fag pediatricians that dairy is THE EVIL. All it's going to get you is a bunch of lactose-intolerant pussy kids to match their pussy parents. And the sad thing is that they're not even going to have lunch money to buy their gay soy milk because my kid is going to be beating them up and taking it from them.
I always tell flight attendants that I'm deathly allergic to dry little pretzels. Might as well be - they're practically inedible.
Eh.. I get what you are saying, but is eating honey really some sort of life necessity? Will a child really be not well adjusted in life because they didn't eat honey? I don't think its helicopter parenting to take some basic steps to avoid some risks, like waiting a touch to have honey or anchoring your large furniture to the walls.
This is sort of a turning point with the intenet age where we do have a lot of information at our finger tips, more so than ever before, so the number or perceived risks is overwhelming to parents, you can't really blame people for wanting to make sure their kids get old enough to have the chance to fuck things up on their own.
Honey has botulism in it. Sometimes.
Take off every 'sig' !!
Ever hear of risk/benefit ratios? Some people are very risk-averse, even when there is a real benefit to doing something. That would be people that NEVER drive in a car, etc.
At the other end of the spectrum are people who take unnecessary risks, even when there is no benefit. We even have a name for those people - Darwin Award Candidates.
In the middle we have normal people, who are willing to accept risk if the risk is outweighed by the benefits. This is where 'most people' are - the ones who will let kids play, but still want them to be safe while doing so. Yes, you can cross the street. No, you can not jump off the roof.
Giving honey to an infant carries a small but real risk of severe injury, and zero benefits. Doing so puts you in the Darwin Award category, and is nothing to be proud of. You are certainly not in the 'the rest of us' category.
Why hold off on cow's milk? Granted that human breast milk is better for human children, but lots of us were raised on cow's milk (frex, I was adopted as an infant) and there did not seem to be a plague stalking us other than polio, for which they were just coming out with the Sabin and Salk vaccines. UNPASTEURIZED milk, I could understand, but it is illegal to buy that in the USA, except commercially to pasteurize and resell.
Unwashed (stupid) masses strike again!
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
If avoiding game meat is so necessary, how did our species make it through the old stone age? Maybe avoiding rare meat in general and especially downer does or old roadkill, but I cannot see how cooking well done doesn't kill the germs in anything.
Yes, the medical community jumped on yet another bandwagon with predictably bad results. In the UK, studies have shown that doctors warning mothers to treat peanuts like radioactive waste have tripled the rate of serious peanut allergies.
What I wonder is if the people giving the crappy advice are paying attention.
It seems we knew a lot more about allergies and how to manage them in the '60s than we do today.
We waited a while to introduce our oldest to peanut butter, my wife was pretty scared about it because she had a friend growing up with a peanut allergy. It just kinda got to the point where we didn't have peanut butter in the house anyway, it just wasn't a staple, not out of any real thought to specifically avoid it.
There is no history of food allergies in either family, though my side does have some heavy animal allergies. We finally gave him a spoonful of peanut butter and he broke out in hives and then threw up about 10 minutes later. We freaked out of course and had him in for some allergy testing, he had a pretty big blow up with the skin prick test and his blood levels came back very high.
This is where everything gets to be an approximation. We still don't know his allergy. A skin prick test just proves that the allergens on his skin react to it. The blood test proves he has the potential for a big reaction to peanut proteins in him. Apparently there are 8 proteins in peanuts, and some cause stronger reactions than others. It is possible your blood test comes back 'high' yet your body doesn't react to the proteins that will cause an anaphylaxis reaction.
Further, it depends how your body breaks down the protein in your digestive system, it could be possible to come back with high levels on the test yet your body breaks everything down into small enough quantities that the allergen never triggers even though you have the potential for an explosive reaction.
The only authoritative way to determine the allergy is an oral challenge, but due to our son's high levels and his previous reaction, would be really dangerous for him until he is a bit older. The only thing to do is keep testing and hoping the levels drop enough to try a challenge.
Right now hes in 'avoid cross contamination' mode and it really is a bit life changing. We have to take an epi pen around with us and be 'those people' that ruin it for everybody. My son has to ask if new food is safe, because we put peanuts in every god damn product. We had a sunblock we put on him that caused him to break out in a rash and we looked up the ingredients and one of them was derrived from peanuts. It is insane.
And nobody gets it, even here some of the comments are really insensitive because they love their peanut butter. For us that substance is a deadly poison that targets our son and it is everywhere, every, fucking, where. I've been on there other side where I've gotten on a plane and couldn't eat the snack I brought with me and complained, but I guess once I get on the other side of it, I realize how scary it can be.
We were playing at a rec center after a group class and he was making new friends playing at a pool table when I noticed a dad come over with a half eaten sandwich to give to his kid... whats on the sandwich... peanut butter! SHIT they've all been at the same table touching the stuff, that kid is little he'll be all over with that food, we have to GET OUT OF HERE NOW.
That is the bullshit you have to deal with with this thing, the world is suddenly full of boobytraps that'll put your kid in the hospital or kill him if you aren't fast enough to stick him with the epi pen. It SUCKS, way more than having to wait to eat my snack until after I got off the plane.
I would suspect that on average the parents who are afraid to feed honey to their kids have a much longer list of "don'ts" than the honey feeders. It is that cumulative restriction of exposure that may impact a kid's development, life, health, or whatever, its not just the individual 'no honey' restriction. Of course, there is the other end of the spectrum where anything goes.
I can say my kids love honey. Its one more pleasure in their lives.
parents of babies who seem likely to develop a peanut allergy
How does one identify a baby who "seems" likely to develop a peanut allergy?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Botulism is an illness, not a thing, so that's a bit like saying cigarettes have lung cancer in them.
Metaphorically correct, but the kind of thing a dedicated pedant would feel compelled to respond to.
Ah...
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Maybe avoiding game meat is "necessary" because we're trying not to have the infant mortality rate of our stone age predecessors?
Just a guess.
I don't want to be a dick but, I literally learned this from my sixth grade teacher. I'm not boosting up my own ego or anything, but I've known that for years, and laughed when I see parents practically bathing their children with hand sanitizer and making sure everyone who comes within 50 feet are as well. Just my 4 hay-pennies.
Winter: I'd laugh at the innuendo, but I'm too sick. *cough*
So when do allergies develop? I'm all for building immunity but if the kid DOES have a reaction at infancy it could be pretty deadly...
There is something peculiar about peanuts in the US that seems to make them more allergenic. Peanut allergies occur less in other parts of the world. (Or so some people tell us anyhow.)
One hypothesis is that we just don't have enough parasites here. IgE immune response primarily targets parasites. Without them, it has nothing to do and starts attacking harmless things like food proteins and environmental allergens like pollen. Elsewhere in the world, those who would otherwise be allergic to peanuts are instead having their immune systems busy with the parasites.
Another hypothesis is that there's something growing on the peanuts here that people are actually reacting to, like a mold or fungus. In fact, that is a commonly offered explanation for corn allergies as well.
I don't know the status on GMO and peanuts, but some people seem to think that genetic modifications are correlated with higher rates of allergies. That's probably just noise in the data, assuming there IS any data.
Why hold off on cow's milk? Granted that human breast milk is better for human children, but lots of us were raised on cow's milk (frex, I was adopted as an infant) and there did not seem to be a plague stalking us other than polio, for which they were just coming out with the Sabin and Salk vaccines. UNPASTEURIZED milk, I could understand, but it is illegal to buy that in the USA, except commercially to pasteurize and resell.
Why? Because people are idiots.
There really is no other reason.
this could be related to an anecdote about Israelis who ate mangos as children being immune to "mango mouth" (urushiol-induced contact dermatitis) later in life: "In Israel, a group of American tourists from Northern America engaged in mango picking and all 17 of them developed rashes. The three patients who had no prior exposure to urushiol experienced milder outbreaks. None of the 15 Israelis, showed any presence of mango dermatitis. Mangos only grow in a few areas of Israel, and many Israelis first come into contact with urushiol through ingestion, possibly creating immunological tolerance in the gut[1]." http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/171613/
This is NOT the same thing. In fact, it's closer to the exact opposite. Infants are born with still-developing immune systems, and honey contains botulism spores which are capable of germinating in subjects with weak or still-developing immune systems. This is a proven risk that presents itself *every time* an infant eats honey, and there's a ton of downside if the risk is realized. On the other side of the coin, there's absolutely no upside to feeding an infant honey while their immune system is still developing the ability attack these spores.
False. Infants like honey. There's you upside.
Two things...
1. I'm not sure you understand.this is about infants...only infants. There is a very real danger of a deadly condition caused by botulism spores in infants whose immune systems are not strong enough to defend against it. Kids and adults have a mature immune system that can handle botulism spores and shouldn't even be remotely fearful of honey.
2. This is a commonly known life/death risk. People who avoid giving honey to infants are likely to a have reasonable list of don'ts like 'don't run red lights in heavy traffic' and 'don't cross the street without looking'. It's ludicrous to say that someone who avoids a commonly known life/death risks would be the kind of person with enough bad habits based on a fearful misunderstanding of science to impact a child's development.
Every common allergen should be ground up and taken by pregnant women, and put in baby food. From shellfish, to peanuts to bees. No time to develop an allergy
My parents found out I was allergic to peanuts when I was a little over one year old, I had some peanuts and I almost croaked (anaphylaxis). I'm still allergic to them today; eating anything with peanuts means an epi-pen, a few Benadryl and a trip to the emergency room for high-octane versions of the same.
I lived over in the Philippines for a few years and came into some contact with peanuts there. The interesting thing is that my reactions were nowhere near as severe as they are at home in the US, almost to the point where I believed I could have shaken them off without a trip to the emergency room (still went though). It may have been my imagination, but it wouldn't surprise me if it was something with the nuts themselves.
Anecdotally, I heard from people there that Australians and Americans were the people they countered most with peanut allergies.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu... "Honey was also spiked with Cl. botulinum at up to 5000 spores per 50 g honey, which is the upper limit of natural contamination. The sterilizing dose in this case was 18 kGy."
Irradiation would be good for many things (I did see the reply saying it isn't 100% in this case).
People are too afraid of "radiation" though.. (Yet use a microwave oven every day.. which I think is unjustly not at pretty much the top of modern conveniences.)
If you can remember going to school with polio victims we must be in the same age bracket, there's no plague but I did meet a 5yo in the 80's who had mild retardation due to an allergy to cows milk, never met a child that was allergic to nuts. A child gets all the antibodies it's going to get in the first few feeds from mum, after that it's just food. These days too many nurses subscribe to the dogma that if you stop breastfeeding at 3-6 months you're a bad mother, because..???
Rather than berating young mums about choosing not to have their nipples chewed off, it would be more helpful if nurses simply gave common-sense advice about the transition, ie: dilute it with expressed milk, experiment with different formula, do it gradually, and watch out for adverse reactions. I felt sorry for that 5yo boy in the same way one feels sorry for a polio victim but making his mother feel responsible for a freak medical condition is not helping. Sooner or later the kid would have taken a big swig of fresh cows milk anyway.
Never heard the one about honey and botulism mentioned in the comments above, surising but I'm assuming that is also very rare. "Surprising" because honey is a natural antibacterial preservative and who doesn't dip their baby's dummy in honey when a new tooth is on the way? - Yeah, I know, dummies are evil too. Rare as it may be, I don't see anything wrong with informing people to go easy on honey and advising jam instead (my kids had "Bongella" when teething, I don't think you can buy it anymore, it was basically alcoholic jelly, worked wonders).
To me the allergy plague is motivated by the same irrational fear the anti-vaxers have - what if that one in a billion is my child? Problem is, that's the only question they ask. Also there's big money in selling household anti-bacterial gels/sprays, not that long ago obsessing about hand washing and germs was considered a serious mental disorder, hard to pinpoint the change but for the last couple of decades(?) we have been bombarded with adverts telling us that obsessing about hand washing and germs is a "healthy" and desirable middle-class behaviour, and of course every second ad has cartoon characters and a cute kid with a sparkling toilet shoved in their face.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
The "bigger" story here is the normal ignorance and arrogance of some of the populace to outthink people who study these kinds of things FOR YEARS.
Hats off I say -- thanks for making more room when your coddling of children causes them to die off as the weaker gene pool. Kudos.
Have you seen the figures for Stone Age infant mortality? In those days offspring dying in year one wasn't just unavoidable but was actually an advantage. These days neither is the case.
Yeah, I really wonder about the GMO issues that may be causing a lot of these allergies and are being covered up in the name of money. Monsanto already did it with NutraSweet, what's to stop them anywhere else?
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
As basically all honey is cooked these days, the risk is very low.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
You are not acting rationally. Your whole posting drips panic. Even for your child, peanuts are hardly a "deadly poison". Sure, the symptoms are spectacular, but the actual risk of death is far lower than you believe. The epi-pen you carry is something you do not do to fight off death frequently, but because it is a low-effort, low-cost precaution that primarily helps against the rather unpleasant effects. It also helps lowering the risk of you killing your family when you drive to the ER, and that risk is actually a real one. But you should have stayed at that party.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
There are clear reasons that evidence-based pediatric recommendations are to use breast milk or iron-fortified formula until after age 1.
1) Cows' milk doesn't have enough iron. My wife treated an eight-month old anemic infant for this reason just today.
2) Cows' milk doesn't have enough vitamin E. Consequences here can include neurological defect.
3) Cows' milk has too much salt and potassium for an infant. I don't remember exactly what can happen, but given the AAP mentions it, it's worse than neutral.
But hey, why should current medical science deter what you amateurs think? Maybe you can find a chicken pox party to feed your infant some cows' milk at, too.
I'm pretty sure the parent poster understood infants may like honey. I assume this was dismissed along the lines of "addicts like heroin."
Medical "science" is finally approaching what ought to have been obvious; that the "epidemic" of asthma and allergies are most likely our own doing. Our homes are TOO CLEAN for children!
Babies have fairly primitive immune systems; like every other part of a baby, it needs to be trained. When babies crawl in the dirt and get exposed to "nature", their immune systems come to recognize what's normal. At some age - about a year or so - their immune systems begin to react to "new" things in the environment, and begin to fight them. So dust or pollen become a problem, especially if mommy has been keeping the house spotless and immaculately clean. Never rolled around on the floor with a dog? Never ever eaten peanut butter? By age 4, you're going to be deathly allergic to them.
Mothers; take your babies out into the yard! Let them crawl in the grass, like us old folks did when WE were babies. They need the vitamin D to prevent rickets, and they need exposure to earth so that they don't develop allergies to the Earth.
Science fiction writer L. Neal Smith has suggested that our descendants born on orbital habitats may never be able to come to Earth; they'll be allergic to it. It may be a matter of shipping a few tons of dirt and dust up to spread in the air filters, just to ensure that our grandchildren can come visit!
There was a study done comparing Israeli Jews to European and North American Jews, with the premise being that parents in North America and Europe have been directed to withhold peanuts from babies/toddlers, while this practice is not in place in Israel. You have a genetically similar pool of Jews that migrated to the 3 different regions in the last 100 years. Jewish children in Israel have an allergic rate 10% that of Jewish children in Europe and NA. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu...
Repeated exposure to 'allergen' AFTER THE IMMUNE SYSTEM IS DEVELOPED, can cause allergies.
Repeated exposure to various antigens before the immune system is developed, tells the immune system to regard the antigen as friendly since it does not hurt you.
That is why you want babies exposed to dogs, cats, cows, beef, chicken, eggs, peanuts, etc.
Once they reach toddlers i.e. 2 and above, then the immune system is working, then latent exposure to various things can actually cause allergies.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I heard that peanut oil is used in vaccine manufacturing and that's why some people get a hyper immune response from peanuts. Same with milk and gluten allergies. Casein and gluten are used in vaccine manufacture.
I was actually allergic to it when a baby/toddler. Or at least I had problems with it. So I got goat's milk instead. But I soon grew out of that.
The study excluded infants already known to be allergic.
So exposing your own kids in controlled circumstances could prevent them form developing allergies... or could kill them immediately.
We hold off on cow's milk until 1 year not so much because of allergic reactions but because it's associated with iron deficiency anemia. (And increased renal solute load.) From Agostoni C, et al, J Pediatr Gastroenterol Nutr. 2008;46(1):99: Cow's milk is a poor source of iron and should not be used as the main drink before 12 months, although small volumes may be added to complementary foods. Infant formula in most countries is supplemented with iron. Breast milk isn't exactly rich in iron, but harder for most babies to fall in love with and drink in unlimited amounts to the exclusions of everything else (a common happenstance) due to manufacturing limitations (which, granted, vary depending on the mom).
Well played, my friend. Well played.
I'm sure you know that "Youth in Asia" is a play on the word euthanasia.
Also, the draft ended in '73, so summer of '72 was the last year this joke can refer to a drafted 18-19 year old killed in action in Vietnam.
Capt. B. E. Obvious, USAF, Retired
You seem to be pretty sure about the content of labels over a decade ago. I find that quite amazing. I can't remember what was on the label of my ginger jam I read this morning.
Toxoplasmosis is harmless for adults but dangerous for foetuses. It causes blindness and brain damage. Dangerous enough to avoid the risk if you have a choice.
In the case of food irradiation, it's not the radiation most people are afraid of. That's propaganda spread by the party the people really are afraid of: the food (especially meat) industry, who wants to use irradiation as a patch on their unsanitary practices.
"I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?
I think the reason people want to feed honey to kids is more about pollen then not having a honey allergy later in life. Honey tends to have a lot of different traces of pollen in it. The idea is if you get exposed when your young your body figures out that the spores aren't a virus. So you won't get cold like symptoms. Instead of feeding honey. I would suggest getting your baby out and about in gardens, nature walks, etc. This is born out in that rural children are less likely to have hay fever then urban children but it could also be exposure to pollution.
I have no clue why game meat is excluded but I have 2 points:
1. In cows the BSE prion can survive everything short of 3 hours at 1000C (must be done in an oxygen free environment). Prions can be seen as primitive virusses. This is not a risk in game.
2. Back in the stone age miscarriage and infant death were far higher. We have really solved much there, partly because we now know what not to do while pregnant.
Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
A lot of individual babies did not make it through the stone age. Families were a lot larger back then.
Never heard the one about honey and botulism mentioned in the comments above, surising but I'm assuming that is also very rare. "Surprising" because honey is a natural antibacterial preservative and who doesn't dip their baby's dummy in honey when a new tooth is on the way?
Infant botulism is not caused by bacteria, it is caused by spores, which is why it is able to survive in honey. It is harmless in older children because the stomach acid kills it, but infants do not have acid in their stomach till later.
I am not entirely certain about exposure preventing allegies. My son has a medically diagnosed food allegy, but was not kept away from any food until he was diagnosed. I initially though the occasional vomitting was due to excitement or food poisoning.
To me the allergy plague is motivated by the same irrational fear the anti-vaxers have - what if that one in a billion is my child? Problem is, that's the only question they ask. Also there's big money in selling household anti-bacterial gels/sprays, not that long ago obsessing about hand washing and germs was considered a serious mental disorder, hard to pinpoint the change but for the last couple of decades(?) we have been bombarded with adverts telling us that obsessing about hand washing and germs is a "healthy" and desirable middle-class behaviour, and of course every second ad has cartoon characters and a cute kid with a sparkling toilet shoved in their face.
Obsessing about hand washing is still a mental disorder. However teaching a child to wash his hands before eating or after a hand-dirtying activity is normal. Children tend to touch the food that they eat and also will stick their fingers in their mouth unconscously (at least mine does).
"it's not the radiation most people are afraid of"
Ahh... No. Sure you are right about some people but their are a lot of people that are terrified of the term radiation...
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
"When they see us coming
the birdies all try and hide -
but they still go for peanuts
when coated in cyanide."
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Infant mortality rate was higher, some survived, but many more didn't. Infant mortality is still high in countries with poor access to modern healthcare services, and was also in the most developed countries until not too many decades ago.
We got through early history by massive reproduction, and it is still prevalent in underdeveloped countries. We expected the majority of our kids to die, especially when they were young, so we just had a lot of them.
Bonjela, in its teething form, is an antiseptic gel containing lidocane...
Nice! ;)
Short answer: YES. This has been well known for over 100 years and there is copious literature. Breastfeeding minimizes the chances that your child will endure lifelong life threatening allergies. It does not reduce the chance to zero, however.
But really, this is the internet. Try a search engine.
Not every method of buying honey includes a lot of labels.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Raw honey is available on the shelf at every major grocery chain that I visit.
Doctors bad-mouth cow's milk because a bunch of vegan pussies with their hippie propaganda have convinced a gullible bunch of half-a-fag pediatricians that dairy is THE EVIL. All it's going to get you is a bunch of lactose-intolerant pussy kids to match their pussy parents. And the sad thing is that they're not even going to have lunch money to buy their gay soy milk because my kid is going to be beating them up and taking it from them.
Actually, your argument may be valid for human consumption of bovine milk, but there are valid reasons for infants to avoid it. Cow milk has larger protein structures which are harder for human infants to digest than human milk. Cow milk has the wrong kind of fats for human infants. Not to mention that human infants need MORE fat than what cow milk provides. When infants are introduced to cow milk (about 12 months old), it should be whole milk. Children shouldn't drink 1% or skim milk until they are 2 years old.
As for soy milk, too much soy messes with male hormones.
You using soap is "a patch on your unsanitary practices", by that argument.
Yeah, you can just buy the cheap Chinese knock-off honey, that if you're lucky, is just flavored corn syrup.
We were playing at a rec center after a group class and he was making new friends playing at a pool table when I noticed a dad come over with a half eaten sandwich to give to his kid... whats on the sandwich... peanut butter! SHIT they've all been at the same table touching the stuff, that kid is little he'll be all over with that food, we have to GET OUT OF HERE NOW.
Or you could, you know, go over to the guy and politely say "Hey my son is severely allergic, could you have your kid wash his hands after eating that please?"