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American Morning
New Treatment Could Spell Relief for Americans Who Suffer From Peanut Allergies
Aired March 11, 2003 - 08:45 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Let's go to Sanjay, about a new treatment today that could spell relief for the 1.5 million Americans who suffer from peanut allergies.
Sanjay's with us now at the CNN Center.
Good morning to you.
It sounds somewhat innocuous to many who are not affected by it, but to those who are, this can be pretty tough stuff.
Good morning.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
Good morning to you, Bill.
Yes, peanut allergies are a pretty big deal.
You gave the numbers there on peanut allergies alone, 1.5 million. If you add other tree nuts, that's walnuts, almonds, things like that, the numbers go up to about three million. The very scary part about that, is these allergies account for 85 percent of all of the fatal reactions. And even scarier than that, is how little of the actual peanut or tree nut you need to cause a serious, if not fatal, reaction. Sometimes it can be just less than a couple of nuts.
Sometimes, in one study, they described a woman who had a peanut bag open two tables down from her, and she suffered a serious inhalational reaction.
There is a new study, as you mentioned, Bill, actually looking at a drug, a monthly shot, as it were, to try to decrease the reaction that somebody might have to these.
Typically, most people will have an accidental ingestion of one, two peanuts. That's what they found. After these treatments, after four months of these treatments, most people could tolerate nine peanuts. Several patients could actually tolerate 24 peanuts after the series of four shots over four months as well. Now that may not seem like a lot, but it's a pretty big deal because, again, most of these ingestions are accidental, and if you can try to decrease the accidental ingestion, you can actually give someone a much more comfortable time, either going out to eat, or being at someone's home for dinner, and not worrying about contamination. Bill, incidentally, this is why airplanes, as well as a lot of schools, have stopped serving peanuts, because of these accidental ingestions.
HEMMER: When the damage is done, you regret it, and look back with hindsight and say, I wish I would not have done that. Is there anyway to know or tell who might be a victim of this before it happens?
GUPTA: Yes, that's a good question. And you know, again, most of these are accidental. So it wasn't even like they had a choice. They may have a -- a knife may have been used to cut their sandwich that previously used to cut a peanut butter sandwich, something like that. But people with asthma have a higher risk of actually developing these allergies. The numbers may be small, but those are the people who typically are at a higher risk.
There are some things that people can do now, but no effective medications. Typically avoidance is the biggest sort of thing. There is also epinephrine injections. What this will, Bill, is actually try and open up the airway, because the airway can actually close up during one of these peanut allergies, but there is no effective medication, really, to try and treat this sort of thing -- Bill.
HEMMER: We're talking peanuts, serious stuff, though. Thank you, Sanjay. Good to see you.
GUPTA: Good seeing you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
From Peanut Allergies>
Aired March 11, 2003 - 08:45 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Let's go to Sanjay, about a new treatment today that could spell relief for the 1.5 million Americans who suffer from peanut allergies.
Sanjay's with us now at the CNN Center.
Good morning to you.
It sounds somewhat innocuous to many who are not affected by it, but to those who are, this can be pretty tough stuff.
Good morning.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
Good morning to you, Bill.
Yes, peanut allergies are a pretty big deal.
You gave the numbers there on peanut allergies alone, 1.5 million. If you add other tree nuts, that's walnuts, almonds, things like that, the numbers go up to about three million. The very scary part about that, is these allergies account for 85 percent of all of the fatal reactions. And even scarier than that, is how little of the actual peanut or tree nut you need to cause a serious, if not fatal, reaction. Sometimes it can be just less than a couple of nuts.
Sometimes, in one study, they described a woman who had a peanut bag open two tables down from her, and she suffered a serious inhalational reaction.
There is a new study, as you mentioned, Bill, actually looking at a drug, a monthly shot, as it were, to try to decrease the reaction that somebody might have to these.
Typically, most people will have an accidental ingestion of one, two peanuts. That's what they found. After these treatments, after four months of these treatments, most people could tolerate nine peanuts. Several patients could actually tolerate 24 peanuts after the series of four shots over four months as well. Now that may not seem like a lot, but it's a pretty big deal because, again, most of these ingestions are accidental, and if you can try to decrease the accidental ingestion, you can actually give someone a much more comfortable time, either going out to eat, or being at someone's home for dinner, and not worrying about contamination. Bill, incidentally, this is why airplanes, as well as a lot of schools, have stopped serving peanuts, because of these accidental ingestions.
HEMMER: When the damage is done, you regret it, and look back with hindsight and say, I wish I would not have done that. Is there anyway to know or tell who might be a victim of this before it happens?
GUPTA: Yes, that's a good question. And you know, again, most of these are accidental. So it wasn't even like they had a choice. They may have a -- a knife may have been used to cut their sandwich that previously used to cut a peanut butter sandwich, something like that. But people with asthma have a higher risk of actually developing these allergies. The numbers may be small, but those are the people who typically are at a higher risk.
There are some things that people can do now, but no effective medications. Typically avoidance is the biggest sort of thing. There is also epinephrine injections. What this will, Bill, is actually try and open up the airway, because the airway can actually close up during one of these peanut allergies, but there is no effective medication, really, to try and treat this sort of thing -- Bill.
HEMMER: We're talking peanuts, serious stuff, though. Thank you, Sanjay. Good to see you.
GUPTA: Good seeing you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
From Peanut Allergies>
