Honey and Food Allergies

by Kelley Lindberg


Honey seems pretty simple. I’ve never really given it much thought. Here’s the sum of what I generally think about honey: It’s a natural sweetener, it’s made by bees, and beekeepers are crazy folk who don’t mind getting stung.

A couple of weeks ago, I bought a small bottle of local honey at an arts and crafts fair, thinking it would be nice to support a local farmer. That started an interesting learning experience.

As I was talking to one of the beekeepers, she told me that eating local honey can help your seasonal pollen allergies (hay fever), because the honey is made using local pollens and therefore helps desensitize you to those pollens. I thought that was sort of interesting and decided to look into that a little more.

When I got home, my friend (who was also at the craft fair) called me and told me that after I left, the same woman had told someone else that their bees spend the winter in an almond orchard. The woman also said that most of the bees in this area (Utah) winter over in almond orchards (presumably in California). My friend knows of my son’s nut allergies, so she immediately called me to tell me this.

So that sent me into research mode.

The first thing I researched is the claim is that some people seem to find relief from seasonal pollen allergies by eating a teaspoon or two of local honey every day for months before pollen season hits. (According to the beekeeper I talked to, you should eat honey made within 20 miles of your home, so that you’re sure of getting the same pollens that you’re exposed to in the air. What a great sales pitch!) The idea is that it’s a form of desensitization, sort of like allergy shots. See “Can You Fight Allergies with Local Honey?” on the Discovery Fit & Health website for more on this concept.

However, the few medical studies I located on this show no conclusive proof for this claim. So while there may be anecdotal stories saying some people find relief, it hasn’t been scientifically proven. If it works for you, great. But don’t expect a miracle. Here is an article from the New York Times about one of these scientific studies: “REALLY? Eating Local Honey Cures Allergies.”

The next thing I discovered is that people can actually be allergic to honey. Honey itself contains proteins, and you can develop an allergic reaction to anything with a protein molecule, so it is possible to develop an allergy to honey. And, like other food allergens, it can sometimes cause anaphylaxis.

Another problem with honey is that it’s made by honey bees carrying pollens back to the hive. That means pollen molecules from all those flowers can be found in the resulting honey. So if you’re having an allergic reaction after eating honey, it is nearly impossible to know if your reaction is caused by the honey itself or the pollen suspended in the honey. The website AllAllergy.net says some authors of studies recommend that allergists look at honey as a possible allergen when they can’t find another culprit causing food-allergy reactions in a patient.

What I can’t find out is if being allergic to almonds means you’re also allergic to almond flower pollen. I know that if you’re allergic to birch pollen, you might also react to almonds (along with apples, kiwi, pears, peaches, plums, coriander, fennel, parsley, celery, cherries, carrots, and hazelnuts). But the world of cross-reactivity and oral allergy syndrome is complicated. So I’m not sure if almond-allergic people can safely eat almond-grove-produced honey.

So I think the short answer is: be cautious. If you have been having allergic reactions that you can’t identify, there is a possibility, it seems, that you might be getting exposed to your allergen through honey. Honey is an ingredient in a surprisingly large number of commercial food products. If this seems to be happening to you, talk to your allergist about performing an allergy test to the honey you buy.

On the other hand, if you’ve been eating honey just fine with no problems, don’t let this article make you panic! If you’re not having symptoms after eating honey, there doesn’t seem to be any reason to assume that honey is a problem for you. So enjoy your sweet tooth.

Everyone is different, every allergy is different, and everyone’s body chemistry is different. And I’m not a doctor, of course! I just thought I’d share what I found out this week about honey. Investigate this more with your allergist if you suspect honey may be causing problems for you.

Climate Change Increasing Food Allergies

I’ve written before about oral allergy syndrome – the concept that allergen proteins, whether in pollens or in foods, belong to a limited number of protein families, and that many pollen proteins are similar enough in structure to unrelated food proteins that a sensitivity to one can make you susceptible to the other, even though the two plants aren’t technically related. For example, an allergy to birch may make you allergic to peanuts, because some of the proteins found in birch pollen is similar in structure to some of the proteins in peanuts. So even though the two plants aren’t related at all, the birch pollen, which gets into your lungs freely because it’s airborne, can eventually trigger an allergic reaction to peanuts. (See "Regional Differences in Food Allergies.")

I also talked about how this oral allergy syndrome may explain why different foods are the allergic culprits in different parts of the world – because the weeds and trees in England are different from the weeds and trees in Africa, for example, the common food allergies also vary between the two regions.

Now there are starting to be several studies that show this oral allergy syndrome affect is increasing because of global climate change.

In a nutshell, researchers are discovering that with the longer warm seasons and melting ice caps, more land mass is staying warmer longer, producing more and more plants. Ragweed, for example, is thriving for more weeks every year in some parts of America. That means not only a lengthening of hay fever season for pollen sufferers, but also more exposure in expanding areas where people can become susceptible to the corresponding food allergens.

Australian scientist Dr. Paul Beggs was awarded the OSMR Jamkie Callachor Eureka Prize for Medical Research in Australia this year (Australia’s most prestigious science award) for his research on the effect climate change is having on allergens. As explained in the article “Global Allergic Reaction” from the Australian Museum, which awards the Eureka Prize, “Dr. Beggs published the first academic papers on the possible impacts of increasing temperatures and changing rainfall patterns on asthma; air-based allergens (such as pollen) and plant food allergens such as peanuts.”

Dr. Beggs isn’t the only one researching these links between climate change and allergies. For example, other scientists have shown that people exposed to higher levels of ragweed pollen and ozone together are more likely to suffer from allergies than from either substance alone.

The scientific literature is filled with studies showing direct, distinct correlations between climate change and various elements of human health, and the link between warming temperatures and both airborne and food-borne allergens is astonishing.

Just something to think about the next time we food allergy sufferers have an opportunity to do something proactive for the environment.

Regional Differences in Food Allergies

I came across a story in New Scientist magazine about possible reasons why people in different parts of the world are prone to different food allergies (“Food Allergies Get Curiouser and Curiouser.”) The peanut is a common allergen in the United States, but not so common in other countries. Melon is a more common problem in Greece. Apples are the culprit in Italy.

Why are there so many regional differences?

This article discusses studies that show a possible reason: many plant pollens that cause hay fever contain proteins that are very similar to the proteins in certain foods. While the plants and foods aren’t actually related, the molecular structure of the proteins are similar enough that a sensitivity to one (in the form of hay fever) might “prime the pump” and make you more susceptible to developing an allergy to the other. The article uses the examples of birch pollen allergies, which may make northern Europeans more prone to apple allergies, dust-mite feces that may correlate to shrimp allergies, and mugwort allergies that may link to carrots, celery, and sunflower seeds.

There have been studies in the past that have tried to examine reasons why regional differences exist in food allergies. In November 2008, I wrote about a study published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology that compared Jewish populations in the U.K. and Israel and their very different rates of peanut allergy. The study used Jewish populations in both regions to try to control as many cultural variables as possible. Their conclusion was that since the Israeli population gives infants more peanuts and has a lower rate of peanut allergy, perhaps everyone should introduce peanuts to infants earlier and in larger quantities. But that goes contrary to other studies that seem to show it’s better to prevent peanuts from being introduced until later in life.

But the study didn’t seem to take into account environmental pollens in the two countries, which would be vastly different between the two climates. The New Scientist article brings up an interesting new angle on that older study – what if the reason the U.K. children have more peanut allergies is because their bodies are already primed to react by a pollen that is prevalent in the U.K., but which doesn’t exist in the drier environs of Israel? It would be interesting if someone could go back to those original U.K. and Israeli populations and cross-check the existing pollens in those two areas to see if a new pattern emerges from that.

So once again, we still don’t know very much about the causes of food allergies. We are still bombarded by theories. We still feel like we’re grasping at straws. However, there is some good news: more and more studies ARE being conducted. Only after many years and many individual studies that test different aspects of allergies will scientists be able to look back, gather up all the thousands of puzzle pieces from all those studies, and begin fitting them together into a whole picture. And only then will we start to see what we’re really facing and how to deal with it all.

On the one hand, it’s frustrating to feel like we still know so little. On the other hand, I have to remind myself that we know a lot more now than we did a decade ago, and in ten more years, we’ll know even more. Each new study turns over another puzzle piece on our table. And that gives me something to hope for.