World’s biggest food company invests in milk allergy test
Nestlé, the world's largest food company, will pay up to $111 million to a French company in a deal to develop and market a milk allergy test for infants, says Reuters. The transaction "complements the company's market-leading infant formula business" and is part of Nestlé's expansion into health services, said the news agency.
Fewer allergies among children on dairy farms
Children who live on farms with dairy cows run one-tenth the risk of developing allergies as other rural children, say researchers at the University of Gothenburg, in Sweden. Allergy rates have climbed in recent decades and one frequent explanation is that children are exposed to fewer micro-organism and have fewer infections than in the past, so their immune systems do not develop resistance.