Mediterranean diet wards off allergies: study

Posted by AregM

A Mediterranean-style diet rich in fruits, vegetables and olive oil can help reduce childhood respiratory allergies and asthma, researchers reported on Thursday. Their study of children living on the Greek island of Crete showed that diet may explain why skin allergies are as common as anywhere else, but wheezing and sneezing are more rare. Dr. Paul Cullinan of Britain's Royal Brompton Hospital and National Heart and Lung Institute, and colleagues in Greece and Spain, studied 690 children aged 7 to 18. Children who ate the most fresh fruits and nuts were the least likely to suffer from breathing allergies, and those who ate the most margarine were the most likely to, they found. "Eighty percent of children ate fresh fruit (and 68 percent vegetables) at least twice a day," they wrote in their report, published in the journal Thorax. Grapes, oranges, apples and fresh tomatoes, the main local products in Crete, had no effect on skin allergies but children who ate more of them were less likely to have wheezing or runny noses, the researchers found. ....Continued on http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070405/hl_nm/allergies_diet_dc_1;_ylt=Atp.rF6qeOW9jWAKwEW58ra4wREB