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October 16, 2007
Breastfeeding and allergies
Being the father of two breastfed sons with asthma and allergies and another two with atopy, I often wondered about the strength of the breastfeeding link. A recent study in BMJ (by Canadian and Belorussian researchers) found that breastfeeding is not protective against the development of allergies or asthma.
The Promotion of Breastfeeding Intervention Trial (PROBIT) did increase the number of women breastfeeding in Belarus. And these breastfed children did not show any advantage over bottle fed children in allergic problems at age 6.5 years. These results contradict other studies, including the Australian 1999 study. The problems with the study are many, not least of which include the low native rates of allergies in the tested population, the 3000 lost to follow-up (out of 17,000-- almost one out of six), or the results of the skin tests thrown out from 6 of the 31 test centers -- one out of five).
Perhaps the biggest problem is that we have drowned the baby in statistics.
| By Robert Maddox | 02:40 PM