Will New Skin Patch Cure Deadly Peanut Allergy?

Published October 24, 2015

(AP)

A skin patch developed by two French pediatricians may cure thousands of people suffering from deadly peanut allergies, the Daily Mail reports.

Researchers believe the patch, developed to educate the body so it does not over-react to peanut exposure, presents one of the best possible ways of treating a life-threatening reaction to peanuts.

The device, which releases small doses of peanut oil under the skin, is currently in human safety trials in Europe and the United States, according to the Daily Mail.

One of the patch’s inventors, Dr. Pierre-Henri Benhamou, a senior consultant at Saint-Vincent de Paul hospital in Paris, told the Daily Mail: 'We envisage that the patch would be worn daily for several years and would slowly reduce the severity of accidental exposure to peanuts.

'The beauty of the patch is that it is absorbed just under the skin and is taken up by the immune system.

'But because it doesn't go directly into the bloodstream there is no risk of a severe reaction.”

Benhamou and his colleague, Prof. Christophe Dupont, have already established that the patch can tackle milk allergies, which also affect many people.

They believe that after about a year of wearing the patch patients may be cured of a severe reaction to peanuts.

But it would need to be worn for several more years before a nut allergy sufferer could safely be exposed to peanuts, the Mail reports.

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