The past few decades have witnessed an increase in the prevalence of IgE-mediated food
allergy (FA). For prevention strategies to be effective, we need to understand the causative
factors underpinning this rise. Genetic factors are clearly important in the development of FA,
but given the dramatic increase in prevalence over a short period of human evolution, it is
unlikely that FA arises through germline genetic changes alone. A plausible hypothesis is
that 1 or more environmental exposures, or lack thereof, induce epigenetic changes that …