The Origins of Peanut Allergy | Hacker News Reader

The Origins of Peanut Allergy

stephenskolnick.substack.com

12 pointsbobbiechen11 comments

Growing up in Germany nowadays Peanut Butter is an option, but way more popular is Nutella. But that contains peanuts too! 13% according to the Nutella website and some of the peanuts are sourced from the USA. So given the peanut fungi hypothesis, why would peanut butter (rarely) cause the allergy and not Nutella? (higher peanut concentration?)

(german) source: https://www.nutella.com/de/de/entdecke-nutella/faqs#haseln%C...

Isn’t it hazelnut in Nutella ? These are way more common in Europe (as walnuts are). Usually in France, traces of peanuts are reported in the composition of product, but only because production lines in the same factory might deal with peanuts.

There are no peanuts in Nutella - the very page you link to shows hazelnuts, which is also what it says on the actual Nutella label: Haselnüsse (13%)

I should have gotten tested for the virus I had a few months ago.

Fixed my nut allergies somehow.

I shat and threw up for 3 nights and a day every hour. Green water after the initial food was out. Home made broth from locally hunted game later to maintain energy levels to stay away from doctors.

Lost a good bit of weight.

Now I'm not sensitive to nuts and lye anymore but ( potentially the gluten in ) most white wines and most champagnes is still a bit tricky the next day.

Potentially got the virus from people traveling from the Black Sea and Aegean Sea. They were sick some weeks prior to their visit.

It makes an argument for why the allergies started in 1980, but not why it persists until today.

I think he means that the added ingredients cause that immune reaction in some particular combination with that food and fungi; That is still applicable today, isn't it? Hence proposed solution, if the assumption is right, make your own at home (with good peanuts) and of course without added ingredients as they do in factory;

If it is “added ingredients”, couldn’t some PB without be sourced? Mine at home says “peanuts (90%), sugar, fractionated palm oil, salt”. I know that some can be purchased which are pure peanut, with no additives.

it's not like aflatoxin would show up in "added ingredients". It's not meant to be there. (If you haven't read the text, the author's thesis is that it that a few fungi infected peanuts make it through quality control.)

What added ingredients? Most of the time it's salt, sugar and palm oil. All of them are natural and used in just about every industrial food. Sugars and fat are already present in peanuts.

Could be salt killing bacteria that normally compete with the fungus but I don't think the concentration is enough for that. Maybe it's a specific type of fatty acid found in palm oil or a solvent left over from the extraction process.

Did they not use emulsifiers before 1980? Or is the aspergillus somehow persistent after 1980?

Very plausible mechanism. I suspect what started in 1980 continues till this day. In a money-centric system people try to even the odds at all costs.

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