Moms: if you are feeling guilty because you ate (or didn’t eat) peanuts while pregnant, rest easy. A study by US researchers showed that a child’s development of peanut allergy was not affected by whether or not their moms ate peanuts while pregnant or nursing (breastfeeding).
Pregnancy and peanuts
The researchers followed pregnant and nursing women: half of the women consumed no peanuts, the other did consume peanuts. They then followed the families to see which children developed peanut allergies. The team concluded: “Maternal peanut exposure during pregnancy and lactation has no impact on the development of peanut allergy in the offspring.”
An allergist at Sick Kids Hospital, Maria Triassi Asper (MD, FRCPC) notes that some moms of kids with allergies feel guilty about what they ate during pregnancy. But they needn’t, because no link was ever established.
“There has never been any convincing evidence that whether a mother ate peanut or not during pregnancy or while breastfeeding had any impact on whether the child is allergic to peanuts,” Dr. Triassi Asper says. “The study should help moms to understand that what they eat during pregnancy or while breastfeeding does not seem to affect whether a child has a peanut allergy.”
Following a 2013 Guideline by Canadian allergists and pediatricians, Dr. Triassi Asper notes that pregnant women do not need to restrict peanuts from their diet.
Also, those moms who did avoid peanuts during a pregnancy can be reassured that avoiding peanuts in their diet did not cause their child to develop the allergy.
Introducing peanuts into a child’s diet
We asked Dr. Triassi Asper how this relates to the LEAP study — which recommends introducing peanuts into a child’s diet between 4 and 11 months of age, and advises that children without peanut allergy regularly eat peanuts until at least age 5.
“The LEAP study is about the child’s diet rather than the mother’s,” says Dr. Triassi Asper. “It can be very helpful to introduce peanuts into a child’s diet at an early age, since this may significantly decrease the risk of peanut allergy in that child.”
The Rochester study makes a similar point: “Tolerance to peanut can be induced early, even pre-weaning, by giving moderate amounts of peanut directly to the infant, and this is neither enhanced nor impaired by concurrent exposure [via breastmilk].”
Resources
Citation: Järvinen KM, Westfall J, De Jesus M, Mantis NJ, Carroll JA, Metzger DW, et al. (2015) Role of Maternal Dietary Peanut Exposure in Development of Food Allergy and Oral Tolerance. PLoS ONE 10(12): e0143855. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0143855