Food allergies are growing in Italy, with an increase of 34% in 10 years reaching +120.8% for children under 3 years of age. The main 'culprits' are milk (55%), eggs (33%) and dried fruit (24%). A problem that is increasing in children all over the world but for the first time an all-Italian survey, conducted in the Campania region, photographs the trend of the phenomenon over the last 10 years in our country. The results of the Epifa (Epidemiology of Pediatric Italian Food Allergy) study, promoted by the Italian Society of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Pediatric Nutrition (Sigenp) and coordinated by Roberto Berni Canani, professor of pediatrics at the University of Naples Federico II, were published in the latest issue of the 'Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology Global', the official organ of the American Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
“There is increasing evidence that environmental factors linked to the excessive use of antibiotic drugs and ultra-processed foods may be responsible for the increase in prevalence and severity of food allergies and many other chronic pediatric diseases”, highlights Claudio Romano , president Sigenp. The data are worrying: “our study, conducted from 2009 to 2021 in all the provinces of Campania – underlines Berni Canani – was carried out thanks to the collaboration of 10 family paediatricians in the area, 2 for each province. Monitoring for a decade ( 2009-2021) in a sample of 105,151 children aged between 0 and 14 years, a progressive increase in the prevalence of food allergies in pediatric age was observed, with a greater increase in children under 3 years of age”.
“One in 4 children, among those who have developed food allergy – continues the expert – has presented a history of anaphylactic shock, confirming an increasing trend not only in the prevalence but also in the severity of food allergies in childhood in our country, in line with previous data obtained by the same research group by querying the database of the Ministry of Health where a 400% increase in cases of emergency room visits in Italy for food-induced anaphylaxis in the last decade had been detected”.
It is estimated that over 92,000 children in Italy currently suffer from it
The results obtained with the research in Campania, according to Roberto Berni Canani, reflect the reality of the other Italian regions. “Extending these results to the general Italian pediatric population for a total of 7,636,545 children and young people up to 14 years of age, we estimate that there are currently over 92,000 children in Italy affected by food allergy”
At the basis of the dramatic increase in this phenomenon there are “multiple causes, from an excessive prescription of antibiotics and gastric acid inhibitor drugs, to the use of disinfectants and antiseptics. But a role of great importance in encouraging the appearance of food allergies is given by the continuous and unstoppable increase in the consumption of ultra-processed foods in childhood starting from the first year of life. These ultra-processed foods, the so-called 'junk food' which in Italy, as well as in other countries such as the United States or 'Australia, is consumed more and more by children, even the youngest, they are able to alter the immune system and trigger the onset of allergies”, concludes Berni Canani.
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