Introducing peanut butter during infancy can help protect against a peanut allergy later on, a study finds [Video]

Reassuring new evidence suggests that feeding children smooth peanut butter during infancy and early childhood can help reduce their risk of developing a peanut allergy even years later.Compared with avoiding peanuts, starting peanut consumption in infancy – as early as around 4 months of age, as a soft pureed paste, for instance – and continuing regularly to around 5 years old was associated with a 71% reduced rate of peanut allergy among adolescents in the United Kingdom, according to a new study published Tuesday in the journal NEJM Evidence.”I was not entirely surprised because infants in Israel are exposed to peanuts very early and allergy does not appear to emerge in adolescence or adults. This suggests the protection is long-term,” Gideon Lack, professor of pediatric allergy at King’s College London and an author of the study, said in an email about the new findings.Related video above: FDA recently approved asthma …