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In the 1990s, parents were told to stop giving their young children peanut butter. The purpose of this recommendation was to reduce peanut allergies later in life. Unfortunately, this advice was not backed by any firm science.
But, experts also didn’t know whether introducing certain foods early in life was a good idea. Enter Gideon Lack, Professor of Paediatric Allergy at King’s College London. He set out to test the outcomes of early exposure to peanuts.
In 2010, Lack recruited 640 children who were already exhibiting allergies to eggs and split them into two groups. He asked parents of the first group to avoid giving peanuts to their children for their first 5 years of life, which aligned with UK guidelines at the time. He asked parents of the second group to feed their children peanuts every week.
Five years later, the outcome of the study shook the foundations of the field. Introducing peanuts into the diets of these young children decreased the risk of a peanut allergy by…
