When Raymond Dunn, Jr. was born in 1975, he had a fractured skull, an undersized brain, and severe developmental disabilities due to a lack of oxygen. He was not expected to survive his first year. [more inside]
posted by toodleydoodley on Apr 19, 2010 - 63 comments

Bad allergies? Take 10 Hookworm Larvae and Call Me in the Morning .
posted by spock on Jul 1, 2008 - 30 comments

Are you allergic to WiFi? Some residents of Sante Fe, NM certainly think they are and they want to take away municipal WiFi to sate their delusions.
posted by socalsamba on Jun 17, 2008 - 98 comments

School bully arrested for spiking allergic classmate's lunchbox with peanut butter cookie crumbs
posted by ericbop on Apr 24, 2008 - 127 comments

Have You Eaten Your Dirt Today, Honey? A New Approach To The Hygiene Hypothesis. The hypothesis argues: The reason why there is so much asthma, eczema, allergies and maybe even childhood diabetes in the modern world is because we — well infants really — live in too clean a universe. What our baby immune systems need is a kickstart by exposure to viruses, bacteria, worms, pollutants and so on. If you don’t get an infant hit from these icons of uncleanliness, the immune system goes haywire and your body over-reacts to all sorts of invasive things that normally could be ignored. Via. [more inside]
posted by amyms on Nov 6, 2007 - 97 comments

N.C. A&T food scientist develops process for allergen-free peanuts. An agricultural researcher at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University has developed a simple process to make allergen-free peanuts. The new process – believed to be a first for food science – could provide relief to millions of peanut allergy sufferers, and be an enormous boon to the entire peanut industry.The inventor, Dr. Mohamed Ahmedna, is optimizing the process further to remove allergens from other foods.
posted by billysumday on Jul 30, 2007 - 34 comments

I think I'll go eat...
posted by dilettante on Sep 26, 2005 - 16 comments

Many common food plants contain noxious and toxic antinutrients designed to ward off predators, including humans. Tomatoes and Potatoes for example contain Glycoalkaloids which cause a Depressed central nervous system; kidney inflammation; carcinogenic; birth defects; reduced iron uptake. Can Genetically Engineered strains increase these naturally occuring antinutrients and toxins? (more inside)
posted by stbalbach on Nov 8, 2003 - 26 comments

"We feel confident by 2003 we'll be able to produce an allergen-free cat" Transgenic Pets, in Syracuse, says it is developing a genetically engineered cat that will not cause allergies, an effort that could allow millions of people who cannot now do so keep cats as pets. The company said it planned to sell the cats for $750 to $1,000 each, about the price of some purebred animals.
posted by 120degrees on Jun 27, 2001 - 50 comments

Catholic Church to Kid: "Drop dead"! She wanted to take Holy Communion, but had a disease where she couldn't eat the bread. When she asked for a substitute, the Catholic church refused.
posted by owillis on Feb 2, 2001 - 21 comments