Study: Exposing infants to peanuts helps prevent allergies later

(AP) -- For years, parents of babies who seem likely to develop a peanut allergy have gone to extremes to keep them away from peanut-based foods. Now a major study suggests that is exactly the wrong thing to do.

Doctors found that exposing infants like these to peanuts before their first birthday actually helped prevent a peanut allergy. The early exposure seemed to help build tolerance.

The research involving more than 600 babies is the largest and most rigorous test of this concept. They were checked first to make sure they didn't already have a peanut allergy. So parents of babies should not try this on their own.

Study results were released Monday in the New England Journal of Medicine and discussed at a medical meeting in Houston.