When children come into contact with pets at an early age, they are less likely to develop food allergies, a large study from Japan shows. Overall, the animals seem to reduce the risk of allergies, even if the children only have contact with them in the womb.
From
Christina Berndt
Cats and dogs protect against the development of allergies. A particularly comprehensive study from Japan has now shown how clear the effect is and how early it comes into play recently in the journal Plos One has appeared. For this purpose, data from more than 65,000 children who had been collected as part of the nationwide, prospective Japan Environment and Children’s Study and for whom information on pets was available was evaluated.