Pregnancy And Newborn Health

Food allergies now affect more than 10% of children. Recently, babies have been found to be at risk of developing a food allergy even before they start eating solid foods.

This team's earlier work has suggested that babies’ immune responses can be improved by their mothers eating more eggs during the first weeks of breastfeeding.

This research trial aimed to determine whether mothers regularly eating more eggs and peanuts during pregnancy and breastfeeding would reduce food allergies in their babies. SAHMRI sought out women less than 23 weeks pregnant to be randomly assigned one of two study groups: a ‘standard egg and peanut diet’ group (which is typical for most women) and a ‘high egg and peanut diet’ group. Participants were asked to follow the diet advice for their group from 22 weeks gestation until their baby was 4 months of age (or until breastfeeding ceases). The outcomes of egg and peanut allergies were compared in the babies of the two groups at 1 year of age.

Serious food allergy reactions, anaphylaxis and food-related deaths have increased over the past two decades. Food allergy is a chronic disease that reduces quality of life, places significant burdens on schools, communities and the health care system at large. Effective prevention strategies in early life are urgently needed.

This randomised controlled trial study design will address an important gap in knowledge. It will provide high quality scientific outputs that progress the field of allergy prevention and will provide a sound evidence base to inform clinical practice allergy prevention recommendations for the role of regular inclusion of traditionally allergenic foods in the maternal diet during pregnancy and breastfeeding.

This project was led by Professor Maria Makrides and funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council.