Allergies on the Rise
You have probably heard someone talk about the rise in allergies. It seems that the children of today are much more likely to have an allergy than the children of 20 or 30 years ago. One of the most common allergies that everybody probably knows about is peanuts. When I was in school in the late 50s and early 60s, no one worried about having a peanut butter sandwich at school. Why does it seem that there are more allergies today?
Unfortunately, doctors and scientists don’t really know, despite many years of research. One common theory is that in North America and other Western civilized nations we are too clean. Our children’s bodies do not get an opportunity to be exposed to as many foreign substances as children from two or three generations ago. Because their immune systems are underutilized the theory is that a child’s immune system starts to attack more things and react to more substances.
Other theories include:
- We spend more time indoors and our indoor air quality is not good.
- There has been an increase in obesity and a decrease in the amount of raw foods, i.e. fruit and vegetables, that are consumed.
- Fossil fuel combustion increase.
Although we do not have an answer to the question, “Why are allergies on the rise?”, future articles in this blog will have suggestions on how to decrease the impact of common allergies and also of asthma.
