NEW YORK, (Reuters Health) -- Food that is exposed to latex -- a
common allergen -- may cause similar allergic reactions as latex products
themselves, a new case study suggests.
Writing in this week's issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, two
Boston researchers report on the case of a woman who suffered allergic reactions
as a result of foods she ate in restaurants or purchased in markets where the
food was handled by employees wearing latex gloves.
The new findings suggest that food workers should follow the lead set by
the healthcare field and eliminate all products made of latex, conclude Dr.
William Franklin of Massachusetts General Hospital, and Dr. Josephine Pandolfo,
a dentist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
Latex is found in as many as 40,000 consumer products, including condoms,
balloons, athletic shoe soles, tires, underwear, rubber toys, and pacifiers.
Additionally, latex rubber can be found in many medical supplies including
disposable gloves, intravenous tubes, syringes, stethoscopes, and bandages.
According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology
(AAAAI), at least 1% of people in the United States have latex allergies. The
first sign of latex allergy is usually a poison ivy-like rash that appears 12 to
36 hours after contact with latex. Itching, redness, swelling, sneezing, and
wheezing and coughing may also occur, according to the AAAAI.
The woman, a periodontist, first developed latex allergy "about 5 years
after she began to use latex gloves routinely in her work," according to the
report. As a result, she removed all latex products from her office. But during
the past 7 years, she noticed her symptoms would recur when she ate food from
restaurants or markets where food handlers wore latex gloves. "She did not have
a reaction to these same foods when they had not come in contact with latex,"
the researchers write.
To test the theory, the investigators asked the woman to drink orange
juice on two different occasions. On one occasion, the juice was stirred with a
latex glove. "Within 35 minutes after drinking the juice stirred with latex, she
had wheezing, tightness of the chest, and flushing of the face and lips," they
report. She was immediately treated with medications to alleviate these
symptoms.
"The elimination of latex, which is already under way in the healthcare
environment, should also be extended to the food-handling environment, to
protect (allergic) consumers," Franklin and Pandolfo conclude.
