Do I Have a New Food Allergy
July 21, 2021Do I Have a New Food Allergy?
We have been seeing a lot of new food allergies lately and it caught our attention when I saw an article in the newspaper about exactly this topic. "The prevalence of serious food allergies ranges from 10 percent in 2-year-olds and 7.1 percent in children 14 to 17 to 10.8 percent in adults 18 and older."
Over 10% of adults have a food allergy! Interestingly, adults can often develop the food allergy later in life. Meaning they may have had no food allergies as a child, but suddenly discovered a new food allergy in adulthood. Of course, the best way to figure out if you have a food allergy is to be evaluated and tested by a specialist. It is important to identify any food allergies because they can develop into serious conditions, so we try our best to identfiy them early on.
Most food allergies are to milk, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, fish, crustacean shellfish, wheat, soy and sesame. You can certainly be allergic to other foods as well, but research has shown that these definitely are the most common. The good news is that food labels require that these ingredients are listed if they are in any packaged foods, restaurants have become more aware of food allergies, and there is increasing education about using Epipens and other life saving measures for people with allergies.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/19/well/live/food-allergies.html