Kid’s allergies ‘may boost cancer risk’
Nov 5 2004
Suffering from some kinds of allergy as a child could increase the risk of developing blood cancer in later life, a new study suggests. Researchers in Sweden followed 16,539 twins for more than 30 years, tracking any allergic conditions they suffered and the development of any cancer of the blood. Writing in BMC Public Health, they said their findings were important because an increasingly large number of people around the world were now suffering from allergies. In the UK around 30 per cent of adults and 40 per cent of children are affected by an allergy, caused by sources such as food, pollen or animals. Dr Karin Soderberg, from the Karolinska Institute, said they found that people with hives – itchy eruptions on the skin – had an increased risk of leukaemia. “We also found an increased risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma among individuals who had eczema during childhood,” the researcher added.
The study found that childhood eczema appeared to reveal a twofold increase in the risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.The researchers pointed out that the risk of any individual suffering from the condition was still remote. In the UK around 9,000 people are diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma each year, while around 6,800 are diagnosed with leukaemia. The study did not find that other allergic conditions such as hay fever increased the risk of cancer. Researchers from the Karolinska Institute said they believed that the chronic stimulation of the immune system caused by allergic conditions, leading to increased numbers of white blood cells, increased the risk of cancer-causing mutations. They said: “Findings from our study do not support the `immune surveillance’ hypothesis, which stipulates that allergic conditions protect against malignancies by enhancing the ability of the immune system to detect and eliminate malignant cells.” Dr Soderberg added: “An important strength of our study is that the information about allergic conditions was collected prior to the individuals being diagnosed with cancer. “This prevents the bias that may arise if people, who have already been diagnosed with cancer, are asked to remember whether or not they have ever suffered from an allergy.”