Feedmeallergyfree

It was half term last week so it came as no surprise to me that I missed the latest news about peanut allergy. A couple of people mentioned it in passing and I thought I’d better look it up!

Here is a link to The Times article for anyone else that missed it! It may give hope to other parents of children with a peanut allergy.

…according to the BSACI (British Society for Allergy & Clinical Immunology).

The aim of the BSACI is to improve the management of those who suffer from allergies and related diseases in the UK.

They just realised an interesting press release regarding the House of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee enquiry into “Allergy”.

In this release, they’ve stated some interesting allergy facts: 

• 1 in 5 of the UK population suffers from hayfever
  - Reduces quality of life and work performance
  - Impairs results in school examinations.

• 1 in 10 have asthma
  - That’s 3-4 children with a ‘blue’ inhaler per classroom 
  - Allergies are a major trigger factor for asthma
  - Asthma may be severe and even life threatening

• 1 in 50 children suffer from peanut allergy
  - That’s one child in every 2nd classroom
  - May cause life- threatening anaphylaxis

• Asthma accounts for 70,000 admissions and anaphylaxis for 30,000 admissions to hospital each year within UK

• Medications for allergies cost £0.9 billion/yr, 11% the total NHS drug budget

For more info, visit the BSACI website.

I’ve just read an article about a new study regarding the impact of a child’s diet on the chances of having asthma and allergies.

According to research, a child’s diet rich in “fruity vegetables” (such as tomato, aubergine and cucumber) and fish could reduce asthma and allergy suffering.  The research which is published in the September issue of Paediatric Allergy and Immunology also highlighted the benefits of the diet on pregnant women.

If you want to read more, click here.

There was an interesting article in The Observer at the weekend titled “NHS swamped by an epidemic of allergies”.

According to the article “The NHS is failing to keep up with the growing number of allergy sufferers, with new figures today showing that only a handful of specialist doctors across the country are running clinics for them.

One in three people in Britain can expect to suffer from some form of allergy during their lifetime – including 2 million people in the UK thought to have some allergy to food – but there has been barely any increase in NHS services to cope with this. Experts will warn this week that demand for care is outstripping the NHS’s ability to cope, and many patients go to private clinics or dietitians that may offer unconventional diets.”

“Britain has one of the highest rates of allergy in the world, along with America, Australia and New Zealand. For reasons not understood, in the last 20 years the rate of eczema and asthma has at least doubled, and there has been at least a threefold increase in nut allergies. Before the mid-Nineties nut allergies were rare, but one in 50 schoolchildren now has one.

Dr Gideon Lack, who runs allergy services at the Guy’s and St Thomas’s Trust in London, said: ‘Demand is continuing to grow, but it’s not matched by the levels of services.’ There is also evidence that severe reactions are becoming more widespread. Prescriptions for EpiPens – devices that shoot adrenaline into a patient going into anaphylactic shock – have risen from 45,000 in 1998 to 153,000 in 2005.”

Next week is National Allergy Week organised by Allergy UK. The aim of the week is to highlight the increasing impact of hayfever and the rising number of people being affected.

According to the Allergy UK website, as part of National Allergy Week, they are launching pod casts and ‘Ask the Expert’ web chats on a website specifically created for this years Allergy Week – www.allergyweek.org.

This new site doesn’t seem to be up and running yet – presumably it will launch into action next week. However, you can find details of the experts’ sessions on the Allergy UK website. 

There’s an interesting entry on Allergic Girl’s blog relating to the current food fight on the other side of the Atlantic between parents of children with life-threatening allergies and parents of the allergy-free.

 If you’ve got time, it’s worth the read.