The Big 8 Have a Big Price Tag
Food allergi
es are expensive. If you needed more confirmation than your hospital and doctor bills (and lost work days) are pricey, then this study is for you. It costs Americans $500 million dollars to be allergic to food.
Total medical costs ranged from $225 million to $307 million, (depending on the type of calculation the researchers performed) and 52% of the medical costs were for doctors' visits alone.
The researchers used information from several databases to find the total cost of emergency room care, hospitalizations, and visits to the physician's office for allergic reactions. Those numbers were used to estimate the nationwide cost of treatment. Researchers then published their results in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
Four out of every 100 people have food allergies -- that's 12 milion people with a classic IgE reaction that can cause anything from itching, hives, anaphylaxis (closing of the airways) and death. An estimated 90% of those allergies are from eight main food sources (called "The Big 8"). These are peanuts, treenuts, wheat/gluten, dairy, eggs, soy, fish and shellfish/seafood.
Another 3 million people suffer from celiac disease - a severe autoimmune disease where even a crumb of wheat or gluten can be damaging. 18 million people (a new study by the University of Maryland School of Medicine) have a slow onset reaction or intolerance to wheat. It appears that the study focused on classic food allergies (IgE responses) and not slow onset reactions (IgG immune responses), and it would be interesting if they would have also included grocery bills and other lifestyle expenses in the mix as well. But this information is a great help in diagnosing the breadth and depth of a big part of the food allergy puzzle.
The researchers were surprised to find that emergency room visits were not the bulk of the costs. The large price tag on doctors visits were assumed to be more preventative and managed care.
