Childhood food, skin allergies on the rise

by: Hadeel

Resource:

1- CNN : http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2013/05/02/childhood-food-skin-allergies-on-the-rise/

2- http://www.health.am/allergies/.

3-http://bbumh.blogspot.com/2012/02/outrageous-and-dangerous-disregard-of.html

I read an article about allergies in children, and how it is increasing nowadays. However, in order to understand what allergies are, it is important to know first the definition of allergies. Allergies are an overreaction of the body's immune system to specific substances that it misidentifies as harmful. In addition, according to the article, food and skin allergies have been increasing for more than 10 years in American children. Between 1997 and 2011 the food allergies increased from 3.4% to 5.1%. While the skin allergies increased more than doubled in the same time. Also, there is the respiratory allergy which is the most common allergy in children younger than age 18.

 In the article they did a survey about children allergies, and they divide the increasing and decreasing in allergies depending on several situations. First of all, income levels, children who live with rich families have higher rates of childhood allergies than others. Second, the origin of the child’s parents, and ethnicity. For instance, Hispanic children had lower rates than non-Hispanic white and black children. Furthermore, scientists still couldn't found a reason for the allergies. According to Dr. Edward Zoratti, he says it’s either an internal bacteria, genetic, or environment. 

Moreover, by analyzing the reasons scientists found that it’s all about our immune system. It’s not strong enough to handle any effect from the environment and other kinds of bacteria. For example, researchers done in Europe found that children who are raised in the farms are less likely to have allergies. In addition, having animals and a lot of microbes around the child, will strength the immune system, and the body will have the ability to fight back. Whereas nowadays our children are living in a clean environment with less outdoor exercises, so all these help to weaken their immune system. Also, the kinds of food are changing to be less healthy and the lack of vitamin D all these are factors to increase the chances to have allergies.