ALLERGIES: OVER-EXPOSURE IN INFANCY
For many of us, our first massive over-exposure to an allergenic substance comes when we are babies. The substance is usually food. Up until the age of ten months the cells lining the wall of our intestines are still so under-developed that they are not able to absorb foods selectively. As a result, all foods are absorbed rapidly. This is the way nature has planned it. Up until that age we are supposed to be on mother’s milk exclusively and absorbing from it, not only nutrients, but her antibodies as well.
As antibodies are whole proteins and very large in size it is important that the intestinal cells be under-developed. Otherwise the antibodies would be too large to pass from the digestive tract into the blood. The passage of the mother’s antibodies to the child in this way is called passive immunity and is important for the development of the child’s resistance to disease.
Problems begin when solid foods such as eggs, meat, fish, chicken, cows milk and cheese are eaten before the cells of the intestine are fully developed. Because the baby’s intestinal cells are under-developed, proteins from these foods are absorbed into the blood. The proteins are not broken down into amino acids because the baby’s pancreas is not yet sufficiently developed to produce the digestive enzymes needed to do this.
Amino acids are the result of fully digested protein and don’t elicit allergic reactions in the blood. Whole proteins, on the other hand, are undigested foods and do bring about allergic reactions. Undigested food proteins are allergens.
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