Nursing mothers who have a family history of peanut
allergies may want to consider avoiding peanuts and foods that contain
them while they are breastfeeding.
New research has shown that peanut allergens, which can cause severe
and life threatening allergic reactions in some people, can be passed
through a mother's milk to her baby. It is believed that many children
who develop peanut allergies had prior exposure to peanuts earlier in
life that went unrecognized. That initial exposure, which some
researchers now say could have been through their mother's breastmilk,
may have led them to be sensitized, leading to an allergic
reaction later in childhood.
Dr. Peter Vadas of St. Michael's Hospital at the University of Toronto
in Ontario, Canada and his colleagues wanted to determine if peanut
allergens could pass from a mother's diet to her breastmilk and
ultimately to her baby. The researchers studied 23 healthy, lactating
women aged 21 to 35. The women each ate 50 grams of dry roasted
peanuts, then researchers tested their breastmilk at hourly intervals
for peanut protein and the two major peanut allergens. Peanut protein
and the allergens were detected in 11 of the 23 women.
The researchers published their findings in the April
4, 2001 edition of "The Journal of the American Medical
Association." It is important to note that the study was
funded in part by the Peanut Foundation, a nonprofit industry group,
and Nestle Canada, a maker of infant formula.
"We found that peanut protein is capable of passing intact from a
nursing mother's diet into her breastmilk," Dr. Vadas told CBS
HealthWatch. "That constitutes a potential route of unrecognized
exposure of the breastfeeding infants to peanut protein and allergic
sensitization to peanuts in the infants."
While not all children exposed to peanuts will develop an allergy, the
researchers recommend that nursing mothers who have a family history
of peanut allergies avoid peanuts while they are breastfeeding.
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