The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

Dogs reduce allergies in kids

The benefit of mutts as pets

Cloud based data management

German researchers have apparently confirmed that keeping a dog as a family pet will reduce the chance that kids will develop allergies - a finding which backs a theory that having a mutt about the house "trains the immune system to be less sensitive to potential triggers for allergies like asthma, eczema and hay fever".

A team from the National Research Centre for Environmental Health in Munich, led by Joachim Heinrich, carried out a six-year study of 9,000 kids, Reuters explains. Parents "answered detailed questionnaires about possible allergic symptoms in their children, from birth to the age of six, and blood samples were also taken from a third of the group to test for antibodies to common allergens".

Heinrich confirmed: "Our results show clearly that the presence of a dog in the home during subjects' infancy is associated with a significantly low level of sensitization to pollens and inhaled allergens."

Significantly, children who had frequent contact with dogs but didn't have one at home lacked the same protective effect. The reason is unclear, but it's suggested youngsters may get "beneficial early exposure to germs carried into the house on the animal's fur".

The team's findings are published in European Respiratory Journal. ®

SaaS data loss: The problem you didn’t know you had

Latest Comments

WORMS

It's Worms, I tell you. Infants put everything in their mouth, and I'm sure they get worms from the house animals...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1632863.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4215234.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/sep/15/healthandwellbeing

0
0

My only allergy is to..

Ridiculous reports which pupport to be scientific fact.

Take your start point, set your target and then selct the evidence to fit your argument. Easy peasy.

Can I have a job as a Government adviser please.

0
0

Evolution

In the days of hunter gatherers the tribe that adopted dogs had the edge.

Ear and snout early warning systems to hear and smell threats way before their homosapian masters had woken up.

Lock on to prey like a AIM-9X Sidewinder greatly increasing the chances of a successful hunt.

Defend territory against threats be it a bear, lion or another tribe.

Even today the little buggers are sniffing out semtex suited suicide bombers. Or helping the blind live independent lives. And now we learn they offer immunity to asthma and other nasty allergies.

Dogs eh... don't ya just love em.

0
0

More from The Register

New material enables 1,000-meter super-skyscrapers
Before you read on, see if you can guess how the new stuff will be used
Boffins build headless robo-kitties
Soft kitty, warm kitty, cuddly little ball of wire kitty
 breaking news
Latest NASA ASTRONAUT class is HALF FEMALE
Newbie 'nauts include lady Marine fighter pilot, male doctor
House bill: 'Hey NASA, that asteroid retrieval plan? Fuggedaboutit'
Republican-led committee also swings budget axe at climate science
 breaking news
You've seen the Large Hadron Collider. Now comes the HUGE Hadron Collider
International Linear Collider ready to rock and roll
Boffins find evidence Atlantic Ocean has started closing
'Embryonic subduction zone' that flattened Lisbon headed for Blighty
Google launches broadband balloons, radio astronomy frets
A careless Loon could blind the square kilometre array
Hubble spies unlikely planet being born in hostile neighborhood
Hoovering a cloud of sand 7.5 billion miles from a tiny star
 breaking news
Jaguar to open new car-making factory in Blighty (virtually)
Britain still makes stuff, it's just not real any more...