Eating nuts while pregnant cuts child allergy risk, study finds
Source: Seattle Times-Bloomberg
The study from Boston Children’s Hospital found that the children of moms not allergic to peanuts and tree nuts who ate five or more servings a week of the foods had a reduced risk of allergies than kids whose mothers ate less than one serving a month.
By Nicole Ostrow
Children whose mothers ate more peanuts and tree nuts while pregnant are less likely to develop allergies to those foods, according to a study that reverses previous doctor recommendations.
The study from Boston Children’s Hospital found that the children of moms not allergic to peanuts and tree nuts who ate five or more servings a week of the foods had a reduced risk of allergies than kids whose mothers ate less than one serving a month. The study is published Tuesday in JAMA Pediatrics.
Previous guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2000 recommended avoiding these nuts during pregnancy yet the prevalence of allergies to these foods still tripled from 1997 to 2010, said Michael Young, a senior study author. Studies examining the link were inconsistent, causing the academy to rescind those recommendations in 2008. Tuesday’s findings are the first in humans to link increased exposure to peanuts and tree nuts in utero and reduced allergies in children, he said.
“The data do dispel the fear that eating peanuts/tree nuts during pregnancy will cause peanut allergy in the offspring,” Young, an attending physician at Boston Children’s Hospital in the Division of Allergy and Immunology, said in an e-mail. “So, a pregnant woman who wishes to eat peanuts/tree nuts during her pregnancy can feel free to do so.”
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