Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff
Speaker 1: Lauren vogelbomb here with a classic episode of the podcast.
Speaker 1: In this one, we get into the science of food allergies,
Speaker 1: including how common they really are and why they're often
Speaker 1: confused with other conditions. Hey brain Stuff Lauren vocal bomb here.
Speaker 1: A lot of attention has been given to the increasing
Speaker 1: number of American kids with serious food allergies, now believed
Speaker 1: to be one in every thirteen children, that's about eight percent.
Speaker 1: School cafeterias have largely banned peanut butter, peanuts being one
Speaker 1: of the top triggers, and savvy parents note a quiz
Speaker 1: sleepover guests on allergies to other common foods like milk, eggs,
Speaker 1: and wheat. Childhood food allergies are a big deal because
Speaker 1: a bad reaction could lead to anaphylactic shock, which, if
Speaker 1: untreated by an epinephrine shot, could be fatal. But kids
Speaker 1: and their parents aren't the only ones who need to
Speaker 1: be educated about food allergies and how to respond to
Speaker 1: a severe allergic reaction. According to a new study, adults
Speaker 1: have it even worse. More than ten percent of American
Speaker 1: adults now have one or more food allergies, according to
Speaker 1: the largest in depth survey of the prevalence of food
Speaker 1: allergies among adults. Of the forty thousand adults surveyed, ten
Speaker 1: point eight percent were determined to have a legitimate food
Speaker 1: allergy to things like shellfish, milk, and peanuts. Of the
Speaker 1: top three allergies severe enough to cause telltale symptoms of
Speaker 1: anaphylaxis like hives, swelling, throat tightening, and trouble breathing, and
Speaker 1: nearly half of the allergies developed as adults. What worries
Speaker 1: doctor Ruci Gupta, the lead author of the study and
Speaker 1: a pediatrician and researcher who previously focused on childhood food allergies,
Speaker 1: is not only these surprisingly high prevalence of food allergies
Speaker 1: among adults, but the fact that only half of the
Speaker 1: adult food allergies identified by the survey had been diagnosed
Speaker 1: by a doctor. Even more alarming, less than a quarter
Speaker 1: of adults with a bonafide food allergy carried an epinephrine
Speaker 1: pen the only way to halt a deadly reaction. Clearly,
Speaker 1: more Americans need to take food allergies seriously by talking
Speaker 1: with their doctors about avoiding certain foods and having an
Speaker 1: emergency response plan in place. But a second surprising finding
Speaker 1: that came out of gup to study is that a
Speaker 1: separate and nearly equal cohort of American adults believe they
Speaker 1: have a legitimate food allergy but actually don't. When asked
Speaker 1: if they were allergic to any foods, a full nineteen
Speaker 1: percent of survey respondents said yes, but when prompted to
Speaker 1: list the symptoms of their most severe reactions, only ten
Speaker 1: point eight percent met the standards of a convincing food allergy,
Speaker 1: like difficulty swallowing, chest tightening, or vomiting. The rest of
Speaker 1: the respondent cited symptoms like diarrhea, belly pain, and itching,
Speaker 1: which are signs of a food intolerance or other conditions,
Speaker 1: but not a true allergy. The confusion stems from a
Speaker 1: general misunderstanding of what is and is not a food allergy.
Speaker 1: For example, many Americans thirty one percent according to a
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen survey, believe that the only difference between a
Speaker 1: food allergy and a food intolerance is the severity of
Speaker 1: the reaction, or that people with food allergies can eat
Speaker 1: small amounts of the offending food without triggering a reaction.
Speaker 1: A true food allergy means that consuming any amount of
Speaker 1: the allergen, even a tiny sip or crumb, will trigger
Speaker 1: the immediate and overactive immune response known as anaphylaxis. The
Speaker 1: severity of the reaction depends on the severity of the allergy.
Speaker 1: A People with a food intolerance, on the other hand,
Speaker 1: can sometimes eat or drink small amounts of the troublesome
Speaker 1: food without triggering any symptoms, and even when the symptoms
Speaker 1: are at their worst, they are usually confined to the
Speaker 1: gastrointestinal tract. GOUPDA doesn't blame the nearly nine percent of
Speaker 1: Americans who falsely believe that they have a food allergy.
Speaker 1: In addition to food intolerances, which, to be fair, can
Speaker 1: make people feel absolutely lousy, there are a host of
Speaker 1: other conditions with symptoms that overlap with true food allergies.
Speaker 1: A common one is oral allergy syndrome, in which certain
Speaker 1: fresh fruits, vegetables, and nuts trigger an itching sensation in
Speaker 1: the mouth and throat and swollen lips. It looks like
Speaker 1: a food allergy, but the reaction is actually triggered by
Speaker 1: common pollen allergies, and the symptoms go away quickly. But
Speaker 1: if your throat burns and your lips blow up like
Speaker 1: balloons every time you eat a peach. You could be
Speaker 1: forgiven for thinking that you had a food allergy. A
Speaker 1: celiac disease, an autoimmune disorder and marked by severe intolerance
Speaker 1: to gluten, is also not a true food allergy, since
Speaker 1: the autoimmune response does not result in anaphylaxis. It still sucks, though.
Speaker 1: In the food Allergy survey, Gupta and a panel of
Speaker 1: allergists were trying to be as conservative as possible when
Speaker 1: deciding if a certain bundle of symptoms qualified as an allergy,
Speaker 1: which means that their figure of ten point eight percent
Speaker 1: of adults with food allergies could be low. The only
Speaker 1: way to know for sure would be to test each
Speaker 1: and every person who reported a food allergy, either through
Speaker 1: a skin prick test or the more dramatic food challenge,
Speaker 1: in which an individual ingests a potential allergen in a
Speaker 1: doctor's office to gauge their immune response. But with the
Speaker 1: sample size of forty thousand, that's not practical. Gouped to
Speaker 1: things that The key takeaway from the food Allergy survey
Speaker 1: is the importance of talking to a doctor to figure
Speaker 1: out if your specific set of food related symptoms is
Speaker 1: a true allergy or something else, Goupta said, because some
Speaker 1: of these conditions are treatable and some of them are
Speaker 1: life threatening, it's important to know what you're dealing with,
Speaker 1: and if it turns out that you don't have a
Speaker 1: true food allergy, that's great news. Instead of anxiously avoiding
Speaker 1: all contact with certain foods, you can take steps to
Speaker 1: avoid a reaction. For example, oral allergy syndrome can often
Speaker 1: be avoided by cooking the offending fruit or vegetable instead
Speaker 1: of eating it raw. And people with lactose intolerance rather
Speaker 1: than a true milk allergy, can enjoy lactose free dairy
Speaker 1: products without giving up the pure joy of an ice
Speaker 1: cream cone on a hot summer day. So if you've
Speaker 1: experienced unpleasant reactions to certain foods, don't suffer in silence.
Speaker 1: Talk to your doctor or make an appointment with an
Speaker 1: allergist to get tested. Knowledge. After all is power. Today's
Speaker 1: episode is based on the article why is there so
Speaker 1: much confusion about who has food allergies? On HowStuffWorks dot Com?
Speaker 1: Written by Dave Ruse. Brain Stuff is production by Heart
Speaker 1: Radio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com and is
Speaker 1: produced by Tyler Klang. Before more podcasts from my heart Radio,
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