"Food allergies are nonsensical. “Why would evolution have us be allergic to the things that sustain us?” Nadeau asks."

The obvious answer would be that evolution didn´t cause this. Why do so many scientists presume that genetics explain why so many more kids are sickly today than in past generations?

A more sensible answer is that we humans toy with the immune system today more so than any time in history. Vaccines have pluses as well as negatives. We have this almost-religious fervor - the idea that we can vaccinate away most anything without consequences. But is it really a good idea to block the human immune system from developing naturally? We would be appalled at the idea of interrupting the body´s natural development of the circulatory system or the gastroenterological system. Yet we try to legislate that parents must permit their kids´ immune system development be interrupted...because we have abiding faith in vaccines. (And no one has legal liability if that faith turns out to be wrong.)

Well said, #1. Nowadays, if a child get measles, it is national news. We do need to vaccinate against the deadly diseases but it is time to really ask why autism has risen 100 and there are so asthma and food allergies? Compare us to other countries without all the "benefits" of numerous vaccinations.

´Successfully lobbied´ = threatened a lawsuit

A full time aide to follow your daughter in school? If your daughter is unable to comprehend her condition and take precautions then perhaps a public school isn´t the place for her.

Take her to a competent homeopath. He will cure it in weeks.

I was born in 1951. In my youth, I knew a couple of kids who were allergic to strawberries, but that´s all. The range of things some kids are allergic to now just blows my mind.

Heroes wear many hats - including those among us who volunteer to be the test subjects for new medications and medical therapies.

I managed 60 years of enjoying shrimp and lobster, then I had a medical test with iodine dye, and had a severe reaction. I was told that eating shellfish will now be fatal for me. Go figure.

The answer could be as easily as an imbalance of vitamins and minerals in the body. Had allergies--food as well as atmospheric--dust, pollen, weeds, etc. Took a product which was only to aid in giving the body oxygen and boosting the energy level, but low and behold the combination of the 14 different roots, vitamins and minerals took care of my allergy problems. It was a win, win situation for me.

A young girl in our town died from eating something in a restaurant that had cooked shrimp near the food prepared for her.

The rescue squad arrived without the proper injectible to save her life.

Please do not minimize the consequences of food allergies.

Wow. Thank you, OP! Read this article if, for nothing else, to learn about a remarkable doctor - a woman of faith and a mother of 5! (she had two sets of twins after deciding to stop with the first child....). What an amazing person. I hope that this work spreads and that many, many others benefit from it.

I used to be one of those naysayers who doubted that a food allergy could be fatal or that it could be so severe. Then a young girl in my neighborhood spent the night with a friend. The hosts were careful not to feed her the offending peanut products. But after the children went to bed, the host mother cooked something in peanut oil and the little girl breathed in the fumes and died. The symptoms described in this article are horrific.

May God bless and keep this good doctor.
Ramona (the Pest)

#9, I won´t minimize the possible consequences for those who actually have them.

But many alleged sufferers are either malingerers (in the case of adults), or victims of Munchhausen´s Syndrome by Proxy (in the case of children whose parents either fabricate or exaggerate the child´s symptoms).

So often we hear of absurd "demands" made by parents who claim their children are severely allergic to some food (usually peanuts).

Remember the entire class of children in a Florida public school who were required to wash their hands, faces, use mouthwash and clean their tongues every time they entered the classroom?

This nonsense was finally stopped when the other parents counter-demanded an end to the extreme demands of the parents of the allegedly allergic child.

#7 - same thing happened to me re shellfish also about age 60.

Thank you for posting this article. Something is going on with our food supply to cause this drastic increase in our bodies seeing "food" as a foreign invader. I wish more research, or any research, was being done on our modern food strains and processing methods. I recently watched a show where a food was processed at 700! degrees briefly instead of cooking at more normal temperatures. There could be many causes of our current predicament but it´s killing some of us and so few care - that needs to change.

Somewhat off-topic - why are epi-pens a controlled substance?

And yet... our life-expectancy is as long or longer than it´s ever been.

I must say I have a high degree of skepticism regarding the ´drop of milk on skin´ thing. Someone who has that degree of allergy probably wouldn´t have lived past his/her first day on this earth.

I can (and do) eat peanuts and peanut-products like nobody´s business but, my brother gets severe stomach cramps if he eats anything with peanuts in it. Too bad for him, but obviously some people are allergic to things others of us have no problem with. I guess that´s life - all have to know themselves as well as the world around them or, as Dirty Harry said, "a man´s got to know his limitations."

I know lots of people with food allergies, and if this can help them, that would be a great blessing. A fascinating article, long but worth it.

I´d love to find out more about the treatment regimen that´s being hailed.

But I refuse to wade through TEN PAGES of tearjerker tales just to find it. Heck, it´s almost as bad as a liberal´s convention speech or state-of-the-union address...

Wow! #1- right on target. I could not agree more.

Sure, some people have real food allergies, but not nearly as many as claim them.

I had a former boss who claimed allergies to everything she just didn’t like. She claimed she was allergic to mushrooms, but would eat a sauce made with powdered mushrooms at the local steak restaurant. She claimed a ‘deadly’ allergy to smoke when she was out with the girls, but had no problem in a room full of wealthy men puffing on cigars.

Doctors in the UK have found a way to use small doses of peanuts to desensitize children with peanut allergies. The principles of homeopathy turn out to be valid. So there is hope beyond epi-pens and adrenaline injections for those with real allergies.

I think that part of the problem is our obsession with ´antibacterial´ soaps and sanitizers. Kids need to be exposed to all kinds of stuff at an early age in order to develop strong immune systems. When they are shielded from every germ known to mankind, they don´t develop strong immune systems.

I suspect that in the past, infants with allergies this severe simply died and became an infant-mortality statistic. Food is highly sanitized (for good reason) but the downside may be that all bacteria are removed and the helpful bacteria that we evolved alongside are now missing.

Quackery and foolishness! And the taxpayers have to pay for an aide to follow Precious around the school. It´s an outrage.

If the numbers were truly known of how many self-seeking, navel-gazing moms who are Munchhausen-by-proxy nuts-we would be shocked. I shop all the time, yet I´ve never seen toddlers and children keeling over in the Skippy and milk aisles. Those very few that might have a real allergy can be helped by a doctor slowly introducing the allergen.

The fact that there were NONE of these children in public schools in the 50s, 60s, 70s shows is proof it´s nearly all quackery.