Asthma and Allergies Influence Pet Keeping

Filed in archive Pet Allergies on October 10, 2006

People who keep a cat or dog early in life, are less likely to develop allergies and asthma later on in life. True... partially, at least. It may seem that pets protect us from developing allergies and asthma, but such a conclusion is only partially true, however.

A new set of data collected from a pan-European survey indicate that it only seems that pets protect us from developing such ailments. The more likely explanation for such conclusions is that people who are likely to develop asthma and allergies (maybe children from parents who had them) avoid or do not keep pets in the first place. So it's not as if the lack of pets make them prone to developing such conditions. It's more of the other way around: not keeping pets because they already know they're likely to encounter problems.

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