Bread, pasta and crackers?all the foods that little kids and picky eaters flock to?share one essential ingredient: wheat. The most widely grown crop in the world, wheat is a staple in the Canadian diet. But if your child has a wheat allergy, it can be tough to avoid.
Here?s what you need to know to help keep your child safe if they?re allergic to wheat.
What is a wheat allergy"
A wheat allergy occurs when your immune system mistakenly identifies a protein in the grain as dangerous, produces allergic antibodies and releases chemicals that cause a reaction. To become allergic to wheat, a child must first be exposed to it. This can happen by eating or inhaling it, being exposed through broken skin (such as eczema) or coming in contact with it in other ways that are not yet understood by the medical community. ?A child may react the first time that a parent can recall feeding the food to their child, but they would have to be exposed to it in some way to develop sensitization,? says Timothy Vander Leek, an Edmonton-based allergist and vice-president of the Canadian Society of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. ?You?re not born with a food allergy.?
Having a wheat allergy is fairly rare. Between 0.2 and one percent of children are allergic to wheat, and they?re more likely to be allergic if they don?t start eating it at six months of age. ?We think early introduction increases the likelihood that you will develop a tolerance to that food,? says Vander Leek. The Canadian Paed...