I DAREN'T EAT THAT!

New Zealand Listener, Volume 7, Issue 171, 2 October 1942, Page 10

I DAREN'T EAT THAT!

(Written tor "The Listener" by Dr.

Muriel

Bell

Nutritionist to the Depart-

ment of Health)

ce¢ HAT is one man’s meat is another man’s poison" is an old phrase for which we now have a new medical term; we speak of the existence of a hypersensitiveness to certain foods as an "allergy" towafds that food. It is not always foods toward which we are allergic-sometimes it is cats or feathers or face powder or pollen from grasses or flowers; we are now familiar with the idea that an attack of asthma or hayfever may be brought on by pollen from grasses. And you may experience eczema, sick headaches, hives or abdominal pain, if you are the victim of an allergy. The term "allergy" means " altered reactivity"; the Americans have playfully used it in a metaphorical sense to express the exaggerated feelings aroused ‘in us by those who make us "see red!" We at least all know what it is to have an allergy towards particular individuals! Fewer of us know what it is to be sensitised against particular foods. Food allergy is more often met with in children than in adults. The constituent of the food towards which the sensitiveness exists is some protein constituent. Thus when children are sensitive to milk it is the lactalbumen that is responsible, and the trouble can be often overcome by boiling the milk, or using dried milk or condensed milk. Again, in eggs it is an albumin in the white of egg. Well‘an albumen in the white of egg. Wellit than raw eggs or underdone eggs. Egg yolk, on the other hand, is usually safe for babies, whereas one has to exercise caution in giving them egg white. Sometimes the food causes no disturbance when eaten, but when inhaled gives rise to trouble: rice powder, sometimes used in cosmetics, may produce nasal troubles. The commonest foodstuffs are often the offenders — milk, eggs, wheat, oatmeal, peas, beans, oranges, chocolate, nuts, potatoes, apples, strawberries, lobsters, oysters, pork, linseed-any of these may be incriminated. But while it may be a common foodstuff that is a common offender, most of us members of the common herd do not need to worry about allergic reactions. Nor do we meed to know that an attack may sometimes be precipitated by contributory factors such as excessive heat, emotional excitement, infections, fumes, heavy meals, or worry. A frequent mistake made by mothers is to assume that because her child’s asthma is made worse by milk, asthma in another child is caused by milk; and thus they give gratuitous advice to their acquaintances. The cause may of course be entirely different in the two children, (Next week: "Asthma," by Dr, Turbott.)