Avoiding Food Allergy Risks

Filed in archive Allergy Blogs , Food Allergies , Living with Allergies on August 18, 2007

This article on WDDT (What Doctors Don't Tell You) points to a Lancet article on risk-minimization strategies for peanut allergy. Unfortunately, the publishers are not even showing the abstract (if there was one), and to see the full article, one has to pay a subscription fee. Sorry, but I'm not going to shell out 30 bucks for an article I can't even have a preview of. For all I know, there's nothing in there that I don't already know. In fact, if the WDDTY post is anything to go by, I am not convinced that the full text of Lancet article is worth buying. According to WDDTY, the article "there are four major things you need to do if you are to avoid a serious - and possibly fatal - reaction, especially if you are not eating at home", one of them being:

4. Finally, and most important of all, you should always test the food beforehand by putting a very small sample on your outer lip. Tell-tale signs of a chilli-like reaction, or tingling, burning, or swelling, are enough to pass on the meal.

I have to admit I've done this previously, when I didn't know so much yet about peanut allergies. But now I know that this is a very dangerous thing to exercise, particularly for people who have sever allergic reactions to peanuts or other food items. For some very sensitive people, even traces of the offending food may be life-threatening. Fortunately, my son's food allergies are not in that sensitivity range. Or not yet. He has never shown reactions to food labeled "may contain trace amounts of peanuts", but it doesn't mean that while he never will.

I hate to contradict doctors, especially those that publish their work in a highly reputed journal such as the Lancet, but I really think it is dangerous to suggest that trying out a suspect food for allergic reactions this way is ok. It is NOT. Of course, it can also be that WDDTY summarized the article in a different context, but I will never know that, will I, because I didn't want to pay up $30? Oh well, bottomline is: trying out food on your lower lip as the WDDTY suggests is unsafe, and for some people, may be life-threatening.