I'm not trying to dis all cesareans, I recognize that they can be life and health saving. But I thought this was very interesting.
Caesarean Birth May Raise Allergy Risk in Babies
Researchers at the Children's Hospital at Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich found the babies delivered by Caesarean section were twice as likely to be sensitive to cow's milk and other food allergens than infants born naturally.
Interesting. Now, did they control for breastfeeding rates? It might be that the same conditions that predispose a woman to a cesarean (for example, she doesn't care to do things naturally and requested an elective cesarean) would also predispose her not to breastfeed...? And we do know that breastfeeding decreases allergies and diarrhea in infants.
I wonder if laboring but ending up with c/s makes a difference? Obviously babies can get infections through broken waters -- could they also have beneficial exposure to the mother's bacteria?
I guess so -- I know my first cesarean-born-after-labor son was colonized w/GBS (I had antibiotics 12+ hours after the first tiny leak) but neither of us had any problems from it.
I wondered about the bfing connection, but shouldn't they know to control for it? Many women who do care about bfing have cesarean-related troubles, and especially if they weren't as informed/fired up about it as some before the birth, may end up weaning or supplementing because of the lack of info/bad advice.
I was wondering if they controlled for prematurity, since elective C-sec or "you're past due" C-sec can sometimes lead to premie babies. And I think premies are linked to higher rate of allergy, no?
--Amanda
My son was super-sensitive to cow's milk protein and he was born via C-section (caused by cephlo-pelvic disproportion), but he was also bfed for 2 1/2 years. How utterly fascinating this research is to me.
Hi. Just discovered your blog.
Interesting article. Myson was born via c/s and has had no such problems. However, he was breastfed for almost 2 years so, as Jane said, that might be a factor.