“Lunch plate warning – Schools respond to increasing danger of food allergies”
Sunday, February 05, 2006

No one knows why food allergies are becoming more severe and more common, says Steve Taylor, a food scientist at the University of Nebraska’s Food Allergy and Resource Program.

Some, he says, attribute it to the “hygiene hypothesis,” the idea that Americans live too clean and their immune systems are no longer developing tolerance to certain allergens.

Food allergies kill 150 to 200 people a year in the United States and account for 29,000 emergency room visits, Taylor says. “More people die from food allergies every year than die from bee stings,” he says.

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