Allergies - Leading chronic disease

Allergies problem is one of the leading causes of chronic disease in America with an annual cost of billions of dollars. Allergies could complicate and handicap the lives of up to 50 million of the population including adults and children.
Allergies are results of an overactive reaction of our immune system to substances that usually cause no reaction in most normal individuals. These substances are known as allergens that can trigger sneezing, wheezing, coughing and itching.
Allergies are not only bothersome, but they could also link to a variety of common and serious chronic respiratory illnesses such as sinusitis and the occasional life threatening asthma. However, with proper management and education, allergic diseases can be monitored and controlled. In fact, people with allergies and asthma can lead quite normal and productive lives.
The tendency to become allergic can also be an inherited characteristic. Several causative factors must be present for allergic sensitivity to be developed:
• The specific genes acquired from parents.
• The exposure to one or more allergens to which you have been made genetically sensitive.
• The extent and length of exposure.

Allergy-free soybean lines discovered

May 12 (HealthCentersOnline) - People with soy allergies may be able to safely eat more products containing soy, thanks to a new discovery.

Crop scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the USDA-Agricultural Research Service's Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in St. Louis have isolated two Chinese soybean lines that grow without the primary protein linked to soy allergies in children and adults. The two soybean lines (PI 567476 and PI 603570A) were discovered during a screening of more than 16,000 soybean lines kept in the USDA's National Soybean Germplasm Collection.

Because the PI 567476 and PI 603570A lines occur naturally they can be successfully crossed into other soybean lines without any genetic engineering. The researchers are releasing their findings with no patents so that companies and soybean breeders can incorporate the lines as soon as possible.

This finding is significant because it may save lives. If allergy-free soybeans begin to replace the traditional soybeans used in foods and other products, people allergic to soy would not suffer a severe reaction after accidentally ingesting a soy-containing food......Read the whole article HERE

Feeling unsafe

Feeling unsafe an asthma trigger in teens

May 08 (Reuters Health) - A survey of a large, nationally representative sample of U.S. high school students shows that there are statistically significant associations between violent victimization and asthma episodes.

Of a total of 1,943 asthmatic students attending public or private schools, those who had been victimized in the past year were 45 percent more likely than those who had not been victimized to report an asthma episode in this period, investigators from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, found. report in the May issue of the American Journal of Public Health......Click HERE to read the whole article.

Vaccine holds out hope for allergy sufferers

Apr 27 (Agence de Presse Medicale for Reuters Health) - Switzerland's Cytos Biotech says follow-up results from a study of its vaccine for allergic diseases show significant long-term efficacy in people who are allergic to house dust mites -- a common cause of sneezing, wheezing, eye inflammation and asthma.

The intermediate-phase trial involving 20 patients, aged 18-56, with nose and eye symptoms and asthma caused by house dust mite allergy, evaluated the safety, tolerability and efficacy of a 10-week treatment with the vaccine, CYT005-AllQbG10, in conjunction with house dust mite allergen......Read the whole article HERE