Giving Babies Peanut Foods Can Prevent Serious Allergy: NIH

BETHESDA, MD — Feeding babies foods with peanuts in them when they are less than a year old seems likely to help prevent children from developing a peanut allergy, federal health officials said Thursday in a reversal of long-standing medical doctrine. There is no treatment or cure for peanut allergy, which can cause severe reactions and is fatal at times.

Children with the allergy must be vigilant about the foods they eat and encounter to avoid allergic reactions, which can require the use of a costly EpiPen to help breathing problems. In recent years schools have taken the staple of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches out of lunchrooms and banned homemade snacks in case peanut products are used.

But the National Institutes of Health issued clinical guidelines Thursday to help pediatricians advise parents on feeding peanut foods to infants to prevent the development of peanut allergy in many children.

“Living with peanut allergy requires constant vigilance. Preventing the development of peanut allergy will improve and save lives and lower health care costs,” said NIH Director Dr. Anthony S. Fauci

The number of children with nut allergies has quadrupled in the past 13 years, and peanut allergies affect an estimated 2 percent of them, the Washington Post reports. Following a price jump for EpiPens, which are used to counteract a severe allergic reaction and cost patients up to $650 for a two-pack, Mylan announced in August that it would launch a generic alternative at a 50 percent discount of the list price. The generic EpiPen will cost $300 per two-pack carton and will be identical to the branded medicine.

The NIH has issued three guidelines for doctors and parents:

• Infants deemed at high risk of developing peanut allergy because they already have severe eczema, egg allergy or both should have peanut-containing foods introduced into their diets as early as 4 to 6 months old. Parents should check with their baby’s doctor before feeding the infant peanut-containing foods.
• Infants with mild or moderate eczema should begin eating peanut-containing foods around 6 months old.
• And babies without eczema or any food allergy should have foods with peanut products as part of their diets.

In all cases, infants should start other solid foods before they are introduced to peanut foods.

Here's how to feed your infant, from the guidelines:

1. Prepare a full portion of a peanut-containing food such as peanut butter dissolved or thinned with water, peanut butter, peanut flour or powder mixed with a fruit or vegetable puree or several pieces of Bamba, a puffed maize snack with peanuts, which can be softened with water or not depending on the child's age or preferences.

2. Offer your infant a small part of the peanut serving on the tip of a spoon.

3. Wait 10 minutes.

4. If there is no allergic reaction after this small taste, then slowly give the remainder.

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