The allergy epidemic

Half of all Europeans may be suffering from some sort of allergy by 2015 if the escalating epidemic, which is responsible for millions of children missing school and being hospitalised and for adults staying off work, remains unchecked, scientists believe.

The dire prediction comes as the biggest-ever research project into the causes of allergy and asthma is about to be launched in Europe. Scientists from many countries will coordinate their efforts in an attempt to find out why rates are soaring and why children in the UK have the third highest rate of asthma in the world.

The inexorable rise in allergies is causing serious concern. By 2015, researchers predict that half of us will have an allergy which in some cases, such as bee or wasp stings, will be fatal and in others will seriously compromise our quality of life.

More than a third of people with allergies cannot go to restaurants or have to avoid triggers such as perfumes, cleaning fluid and animals. Asthma alone is responsible for an estimated 9 billion working days lost each year in the European Union.

Allergies among children are most worrying of all, and are responsible for the growing numbers suffering from asthma. Thirty years ago, about a third of asthma cases were said to be caused by allergy. Now it is 80%. Asthma is the main reason children miss school and is the leading cause of the hospitalisation of children in the world.

UK children are particularly hard hit. A study by the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood found that the UK has more teenage asthma cases than any other country in Europe, with 32,2% of 13 to 14-year-olds affected. Ireland came next, with 29,1%, followed by Malta and Finland on 16%.

Scientists think our genes may be partly responsible. Only two countries in the world had worse teenage asthma figures — Australia and New Zealand.

In those countries, said Paul van Cauwenberge, dean of the medical faculty of the University of Ghent in Belgium, ”close to 50% of children are allergic. It has become almost more normal to be allergic than not”. In the UK, he said, 40% of children have some sort of allergy.

Professor Van Cauwenberge is coordinator of the five-year research programme that will bring together 25 universities and research institutes to tackle nine issues which scientists believe hold the key to the allergy epidemic. The European commission is expected to put in â,¬14,4-million at its launch on Thursday.

The project, called the Global Allergy and Asthma European Network, will bring together the fragmented information and evidence on allergies that already exists and build on it. ”I hope that after two years we will already have some answers and within five years we will have final answers,” he said.

A key focus will be on the hypothesis that the rise in allergies could be directly linked to the way we live, in bacteria-free homes eating semi-sterile food. Children exposed to more infections in early life are less prone to allergies and children raised on farms are less likely than others to get hay fever, asthma and eczema.

Scientists at Southampton University will be coordinating the research on food allergies, which will include an investigation into whether changes in diet could prevent allergies developing.

Other researchers will investigate why people who work in offices are more susceptible. Gender is also an issue — in infancy, boys are more likely to be asthmatic than girls, but the trend is reverse by adolescence. Pollution from diesel particles is also implicated. ”People living within 50 metres of a motorway have more chance of developing allergies,” said Prof Van Cauwenberge.

He hopes that better treatments and simple diagnostic tests, particularly for food allergies in children, will emerge during the project.

The allergy epidemic: who suffers most

The percentage of teenagers aged 13 to 14 in Europe reported to be wheezing in a 12-month period

United Kingdom: 32,2

Ireland: 29,1

Malta: 16

Finland: 16

Germany: 13,8

France: 13,5

Sweden: 12,9

Belgium: 12

Austria: 11,6

Estonia: 10,8

Spain: 10,3

Portugal: 9,5

Uzbekistan: 9,2

Italy: 8,9

Latvia: 8,4

Poland: 8,1

Russian federation: 4,4

Greece: 3,7

Georgia: 3,6

Romania: 3

Albania: 2,6

Source: WHO