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Comment by raverbashing | Hacker News Reader

And the best prevention is giving small kids peanut based foods

But since some genius thought the best course of action was not exposing kids to it, we have the present situation (especially in the US)

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According to my pediatrician, research shows that exposing children to peanuts earlier decreases the likelihood of a child developing a peanut allergy.

I gave my son a bite of the peanut butter cookie I was eating, when he was six months old, nearly killed him. So this "expose them early and it's not a problem" maybe true part of the time for some allergens, but certainly not all the time for all allergens.

Edit: Down voters care to comment?

Peanuts are one of the specific allergens for what was actually said upthread (early exposure is the best way of reducing the likelihood of developing an allergy) has been shown to be true; the explosion in peanut allergies in the US is a direct result of bad recommendation to generally avoid early exposure which has now been lifted and replaced with different guidance.

That doesn't mean, however, that there is no risk of developing an allergy even with early exposure.

I didn't downvote, but "expose them early and it's not a problem" isn't the advice, the advice is that early exposure reduces the chances of allergies.

In any case, it is a statistical assertion, not a guarantee.

Do you think peanut butter might be the problem? As in most Americans don't eat raw peanuts but processed versions which might be more concentrated and exacerbate the allergies?

Peanut butter though is just peanuts, same concentration of everything as a peeled peanut. Large companies put lots of salt and sugar in too, I can't stand the sweet ones.

Maybe there's greater availability of some protein, or something, because of the processing?

Ask an allergist/pediatrcian what they would do with their children. The answer most likely would be to "challenge" nut allergies with low doses if symptoms occur and introduce a variety of foods early on as appropriate.

If you read the research on that one. It seems pretty badly done in my opinion.

Maybe, maybe not. It's just unclear.

My wife ate a ton of peanut butter during her pregnancy. One would think it would have protected our son, but it didn't. He's now eight and the peanut allergy is getting worse.

The evidence is pretty convincing. You saying "it's just unclear" is just you misinterpreting "decreases the likelihood" to include "to zero".

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