Childhood Allergies

Childhood Allergies in the 21st Century

Childhood AllergiesAllergies in children are skyrocketing today. When I was in elementary school, I knew very few children with food allergies or asthma. Today, approximately 30 million children, nearly one-third of America’s children, are affected by one of the four new childhood epidemics: autism, ADHD, asthma, and allergies.

  • Autism – There has been a 1500% increase in the past 2 decades.
  • Asthma now affects 1 in every 11 children.
  • Allergies affect 1 in 4 children. There has been a significant increase in the past 20 years, especially peanut allergies. Peanut allergies doubled from 1997 − 2002.
  • ADHD now impacts 10 per cent of children between 2 & 17.

One question I hear a lot is “Why?” Why are there now so many children with these diseases? It’s not a question that is asked enough. We are too focused on treating the symptoms without determining the underlying causes.

There are a number of theories that attempt to answer to this question. These theories seek to address the increasing incidence and will not necessarily be applicable to every case. But they seek to answer the question about why one-third of our children are now sick.

This post is the first in a series of blog posts where I will explore this question. Each post will focus on one theory. In the last post in the series, I will tell you which theory I believe is the answer. You can see the other posts here:

Stay tuned!

Barbara
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4 thoughts on “Childhood Allergies in the 21st Century”

    1. Hi Melanie! I remember that your youngest has many allergies. And I understand it can be overwhelming. Keep reading!

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