Amish Kids Almost Never Get Allergies and Scientists Finally Know Why

The essential concept of early introduction to potential allergens has been around for a long time, and some early blunt attempts have not worked out well.

It's exciting to think there might be some research to refine the concept to something practically applicable.

Michie said:

How Amish barns could hold the secret to preventing the onset of allergies.

In today’s world, allergies are nearly unavoidable. For instance, a report from Stanford Medicine suggests that nearly 40 percent of the human population (over three billion people) suffers from at least one allergic condition, making allergies one of the most widespread health issues globally.

The situation is even worrisome in the US, where over 50 percent of all kids suffer from this problem. However, surprisingly, there’s one group in America that seems almost immune to allergies, the Amish. Compared to the earlier 50 percent figure, only seven percent of Amish kids have developed any allergic condition.



Continued below.

Amish Kids Almost Never Get Allergies and Scientists Finally Know Why

How Amish barns could hold the secret to preventing the onset of allergies.

www.zmescience.com

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That said, grew up on a farm before we had air conditioning, and was around farm animals as long as I can remember. Hogs, cows, chickens,. A neighbor had a mule and was around that, too. I was in the dirt, in the mud, and my preschool idea of fun was crawling in the dusty crawlspace under the house. We had dogs and cats. We hunted and fished and cleaned what we killed and caught. And I had allergies. Still do, but not as bad. I know the study didn't say the Amish had no allergies, but I'm still skeptical about the reason the rate is low.

That explanation could be overly reductive, focusing on one aspect of their lifestyle: exposure to microbes in the ambient environment, to the exclusion of other contributing factors. Amish diets are also quite different, having less processed foods, sugar, and more fermented vegetables. Most Americans eat alot of sugar and they don't consume alot of fermented foods, in comparison (up until a few decades ago, almost all yoghurt was pasturized in stores, and some still is... and if you buy sauerkraut in a can, it is guaranteed to have no probiotic value).

RileyG said:

That's quite interesting! I thought some of them had increased illness because many of them, for a lack of a better word, married inside families since they don't marry outside the family, as I recall learning in high school biology many moons ago.

Thanks for posting!

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That’s a specific condition, “Maple syrup urine syndrome”, but its avoidable with more careful avoidance of ill-advised marriages (this problem is not specific to the Amish but is also experienced by other endogamous groups such as the Pars, one of the two groups of Zoroastrians in India, who migrated to India many centuries before the Iranis, and who were required to promise not to convert anyone to their religion, a promise which they interpret extremely literally and refuse to violate on the basis of ethics, but which is causing problems due to their shrinking population (as far as I’m aware the remaining Zoroastrians in Iran made no such promise).

However insofar as that symptom of inbreeding can be avoided its possible the Amish might have healthy environmental factors that reduce the risk of developing allergies.

I myself had no allergies in my childhood, thankfully; indeed I used to intentionally place pollen in my nose to show off (since I was able to do this without sneezing; however, I’ve always been a sun-sneezer). The first time I had an allergic reaction was as an adolescent, at 14 traveling to Europe, to all the cigarette smoke, which gave me a sore throat and later a sinus infection and was the only unpleasant aspect of that trip.