Peanut allergies have plummeted among kids since 2017 – what happened?

Blockbuster research has upended assumptions about the allergy. Experts shared what parents should know about introducing food allergens

According to a paper published in the Journal of Pediatrics this month, the number of peanut allergy diagnoses among children has dropped over 40% since 2017.

The reason? Food allergy guidelines have undergone a massive sea change in the past decade.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, parents were urged not to introduce their children to peanuts – one of the most common food allergens – until the child was at least three years old.

But in 2015, a blockbuster paper in the New England Journal of Medicine known as the Leap (Learning Early About Peanut allergy) study found that introducing the food to babies when they were just a few months old could reduce a child’s risk of developing the allergy by over 80%. Public health guidelines shifted and in 2017 the Prevention of Peanut Allergy Guidelines recommended introducing peanut protein to infants.