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178 points JumpCrisscross | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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legitster ◴[] No.45647922[source]
One of my conspiracy theories that I loosely hold is that the majority of the fears that we have been sold on allergies was a direct result of marketing efforts by the inventors of the Epipen.

Anaphylactic shock is extremely rare. And even in cases of anaphylactic shock, it's only fatal in an even rarer number of cases (which makes sense, anaphylactic shocks is a biological reaction of your body to save itself, not kill itself).

We really don't know how many lives emergency epinephrine has saved, but it may have only been necessary in less than 1 out of 50 cases. However, it benefitted the manufacturer to overemphasize the prevalence of dangerous food allergies and the risks of shock and encourage doctors to prescribe them in increasingly more "just in case" cases".

It's in this world that parents and doctors alike became insanely cautious and paranoid about introducing allergens. Conveniently, we saw the rise of simpler, more highly processed baby and childrens' foods at the same time.

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MeetingsBrowser ◴[] No.45648230[source]
I'm not a doctor but it feels like there are a lot of holes here.

> Anaphylactic shock is extremely rare

~5% of people in the US have experienced anaphylaxis, but I don't know your definition of rare.

> it's only fatal in an even rarer number of cases

Could this be due to epipens being commonly carried by people likely to experience anaphylaxis?

> anaphylactic shocks is a biological reaction of your body to save itself, not kill itself

Because it is an immune response? Is the implication here that anaphylactic shock is actually a good thing?

And focusing on the conspiracy part itself

> the majority of the fears that we have been sold on allergies was a direct result of marketing efforts by the inventors of the Epipen.

Implying the increase in EpiPen prescriptions caused people to be more cautious about food allergies feels exactly backwards.

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margalabargala ◴[] No.45648897[source]
> ~5% of people in the US have experienced anaphylaxis, but I don't know your definition of rare.

What's your source here, and how many of those people actually experienced a non-allergic one-off angioedema that was misdiagnosed as anaphylaxis "just in case"? Or worse, wasn't even diagnosed, their parent saw them experience angioedema after eating something for the first time and assumed an allergy without any diagnosis ever?

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1. MeetingsBrowser ◴[] No.45649398[source]
"Anaphylaxis in America: the prevalence and characteristics of anaphylaxis in the United States"

> The most common triggers reported were medications (34%), foods (31%), and insect stings (20%)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24144575/

not a doctor but a "one off face swelling" after eating something for the first time seems like it would be much more rare than an actual allergic reaction.

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2. margalabargala ◴[] No.45649833[source]
That's what I thought too, until I had a one off face swelling and throat closing event after eating a new food and went to an allergist, only to learn I was not allergic and have had successful re-eatings of that food.

What I learned from the allergist is, histamine angioedema is essentially the same thing as anaphylaxis, and is treated the same, but is different in cause in that repeat exposure to the food item will not cause a repeat episode.

I'm not a doctor either, but according to my allergist (who is), most people who think they are allergic to some random thing that most people have never heard of people being allergic to, are not in fact allergic to that thing.

Reading the full text of the article you linked it looks like their criteria cover both angioedema and anaphylaxis and add the two together.

Here's some additional info:

https://knyamed.com/blogs/difference-between/angioedema-vs-a...

https://emcrit.org/ibcc/angioedema/#diagnosis_of_angioedema