Excluding the kids .... those 76..... the ones that clearly are allergic and won't ever prove that early introduction prevents allergies is part of the problem. Yes, you obviously can not feed those kids the double blind anything ..... and you aren't going to be able to put any prevention or prevented label on them.
Yes.
And yes, what I was suggesting is that having atopic genes clearly isn't sufficient to predict food allergy in particular, and maybe-- maybe-- early introduction will move the needle BACK to where it used to be-- but-- and this is a BIG but--
why is it, then, that the predominant food allergen in any cultural setting seems to be whatever superpotent (seed storage or marine myoglobin) protein is MOST UBIQUITOUS in the local food chain?
This early introduction study does not, IMO, address that central issue. In fact, ignores it.
So in the Middle East, that allergen is sesame. In North America, it is peanut. In some Nordic nations, it's a fish protein.
You cannot for one minute argue that this is a matter of 'early avoidance.' It isn't. If anything, it's a matter of the allergen being EVERYWHERE...
DD was definitely exposed via breast milk to everything but seafood, including nuts, fish, etc. etc. Just as clearly-- in retrospect-- she was reactive to some of her anaphylaxis triggers very very early.... maybe even 'from birth' though I can't actually say that for certain.
There was some thought a while back that this was a matter of ROUTE of exposure, not timing-- that is, that exposure through eczema-damaged skin to whatever-it-is food proteins produces sensitization. Filiggrin defect stuff. I'm still not convinced that this is entirely wrong-- and that maybe this is a real phenomenon in "high risk infants" as well.
And yes, I realize that Dr. Lack is approaching this from the angle of preventing such sensitization via oral introduction occurring BEFORE skin exposure in such infants...
I also am sick and tired of the national medical advisory boards trotting out new ways to "blame" parents for their children's problems, conveniently FORGETTING that it was their stupid, and poorly researched "advice" to AVOID early exposure that maybe contributed to the wave of "allergic" kids in the early 2000's who were sensitized, but not clinically reactive.... or at least not MUCH clinically reactive-- and what the heck was all of this "avoid during pregnancy and lactation" business, anyway?? Where did THAT come from? Why were women told that for a decade??
It had less basis than this, I will say that.
Of course, I think what gvmom is pointing out here is that this isn't a TON better because it's so preliminary-- and the N is so small, relatively speaking, for the high number of participants who were DQ'ed out.
So yes. What about those 76-- what of them? Because those 76? They are US.