Vitamin D, the gut and food allergies

What's behind the current allergy epidemic? New research linking a lack of vitamin D with food allergies in children is an important new piece in the jigsaw.

Vitamin D deficiency has been linked to a range of health issues from poor bone health to heart disease, diabetes and some cancers.

Now Australian researchers have found a new connection: children with vitamin D deficiency are at an increased risk of food allergies.

Allergy rates have massively increased over the past 20 years. In Australia, food allergies are of particular concern with studies finding one in 10 children under 12 months of age is affected.

In new research, a team led by Professor Katie Allen, paediatric gastroenterologist, allergist and researcher with Murdoch Children's Research Institute (MCRI), found children deficient in vitamin D are three times more likely to have a food allergy. They are also more likely to have multiple food allergies.

"This study provides the first direct evidence that vitamin D sufficiency may be an important protective factor for food allergy in the first year of life; this adds supporting evidence for medical correction of low vitamin D levels," Allen says.

The rise in food allergy runs parallel with increased prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in pregnancy (and in the community generally), but it's not clear if this is a cause or if other factors occurring during the child's first year of life are to blame.

Inadequate exposure to sunlight, rather than diet, is the most common cause of low vitamin D levels as vitamin D is present in only very low amounts in most foods.

The new findings are based on a study of more than 5000 children and confirm earlier research showing the further you live from the equator the more likely you are to have food allergy.

Interestingly, it appears the link between vitamin D and food allergy was found only in children whose parents were born in Australia, leading researchers to speculate that genetic factors, such as parents' ethnicity, may also play a role.

Reducing your child's allergy risk

Unfortunately there aren't specific guidelines on how to reduce a child's allergy risk, but Allen and her colleagues believe the current evidence suggests a few simple steps could help.

These include:

breastfeed your baby for at least six months
introduce a wide variety of solid foods around six months
learn to be more relaxed if your baby is exposed to environments that aren't perfectly clean (that doesn't mean you should ignore everyday hygiene measures, such as handwashing etc)
ensure your children get enough safe sunlight exposure to meet their vitamin D needs (this is also likely to important for mothers during pregnancy). For more information on how to do this see Vitamin D: how do you know you are getting enough?
Allen recommends pregnant women have their vitamin D levels checked and parents talk to their GP about testing their baby if they have any concerns.

Read more at: depkhoenews.com