clair088

Peanut allergy is a well known food allergy estimated to include 3-4% of the US population and accounts for a disproportionate number of severe allergic reactions. The vast majority of food allergy death is related to peanut allergy and is often ingested accidentally despite strict food avoidance. Peanut allergy sensitivity often fails to diminish over time compared to other food allergens causing a lifetime of anxiety and food avoidance for patients and families. The only effective treatment option for this epidemic other than food avoidance is ready access to injectable epinephrine.  Recent clinical trials using double blind, placebo controlled food challenges (DBPCFC) have reported success with allergen immunotherapy and desensitization with common food allergens including peanut. Although long term tolerance can be achieved with daily intake, most patients experienced mild to severe symptoms including anaphylaxis which occurred in up to 25% of patients with a high peanut specif...

Unlike bacteria or fungi, herpes viruses establish life-long infection in the human host through latent genomic persistence within the host cells nuclei and are thus considered part of the human microbiome. The ability of the virus to interact with the human genome influences allergic and atopic disease due to the bias these patients have towards a Th2 profile. Dr. David Dreyfus examined the role of common human herpes viruses on the microbiome of atopic patients, who have more severe and atypical disease when infected ( J Allergy Clin Immunol 2013; 132(6): 1278-1286 ). The herpes virus Epstein Barr (EBV or mononucleosis) expresses latency in lymphocytes and has co-evolved with humans long enough to encode for a protein that resembles the cytokine IL-10, as well as other cytokines by activating host transcription factors. The author explains that EBV and other herpes viruses encode for microRNAs that cause immunomodulation of distant cells. This lead to studies suggesting that EBV infe...