Harbottle Zoe, Pettersson Jakob, Golding Michael A, Jonsson Marina, Roos Leslie E, Protudjer Jennifer L P
Department of Pediatrics and Child Health, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, Max Rady College of Medicine, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada.
Children's Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba, 501G-715 McDermot Ave, Winnipeg, MB, R3E 3P4, Canada.
Allergy Asthma Clin Immunol. 2025 Mar 30;21(1):14. doi: 10.1186/s13223-025-00958-3.
Food insecurity is a growing concern, that is currently estimated to affect 1 in 4 Canadian children. Due to the additional effort required for management and the disproportionate cost of allergy friendly foods, households with food allergy may be at increased risk of experiencing food insecurity. With this in mind, we aimed to describe and compare the prevalence of food insecurity amongst children in households managing pediatric food allergy between 2019, 2020 and 2022 using a repeated cross-sectional design. A total of 117 participants were recruited via social media between these three distinct timepoints, referred to as waves. All participants completed an anonymous online survey consisting of demographic questions and the Household Food Security Module from the Canadian Community Health Survey. Rates of child food insecurity were comparable between Waves 1 and 2 (34% and 35%, respectively; p=0.75), but, increased significantly between Waves 2 and 3 (35% and 56%, respectively; p=0.005). Amongst children identified as food insecure, the proportion who were marginally food insecure remained relatively stable, whereas, levels of moderate food insecurity appeared to increase, although not significantly. Conversely, the proportion classified as severely food insecure decreased across the waves, but again, this difference was not statistically significant. Our findings demonstrate an upward trend in child food insecurity levels, showcasing the need for a larger scale, longitudinal evaluation of the intersection between food allergy and food insecurity. We call on researchers and policy makers to attend to this important issue.
粮食不安全问题日益受到关注，目前估计每4名加拿大儿童中就有1人受其影响。由于管理所需的额外努力以及适合过敏人群食品的成本过高，有食物过敏患儿的家庭面临粮食不安全问题的风险可能更高。考虑到这一点，我们旨在采用重复横断面设计，描述和比较2019年、2020年和2022年管理儿童食物过敏的家庭中儿童粮食不安全的患病率。在这三个不同的时间点（称为波次），通过社交媒体共招募了117名参与者。所有参与者都完成了一项匿名在线调查，其中包括人口统计学问题以及加拿大社区健康调查中的家庭粮食安全模块。第1波和第2波儿童粮食不安全率相当（分别为34%和35%；p=0.75），但在第2波和第3波之间显著上升（分别为35%和56%；p=0.005）。在被认定为粮食不安全的儿童中，粮食安全状况处于边缘水平的儿童比例相对稳定，而中度粮食不安全水平似乎有所上升，尽管不显著。相反，被归类为严重粮食不安全的儿童比例在各波次中有所下降，但同样，这种差异在统计学上并不显著。我们的研究结果表明儿童粮食不安全水平呈上升趋势，这表明需要对食物过敏与粮食不安全之间的交叉点进行更大规模的纵向评估。我们呼吁研究人员和政策制定者关注这一重要问题。
