The 1 Health Advantage Dogs May Give Their Owners

Ah, dogs. We love them so much at HuffPost UK that we can’t stop writing about ’em ― we’ve already shared, for instance, the annoying behaviour all dog owners should encourage when taking their furry friend for a walk. 

We’ve revealed the non-tail-wagging signs your dog is really happy, too. 

But what about what your canine does for your health?

On a recent episode of gut health company ZOE’s podcast, co-founder Jonathan Wolf interviewed Dr. Gideon Lack, a professor of paediatric allergy at King’s College London. 

He said that though they’re absolutely not definitive, “there are two studies now showing that babies who are born into a home with a dog have about a 50% reduced chance of developing food allergies.” 

Does having a dog definitely halve my kid’s chances of getting food allergies?

No, and Dr. Lack doesn’t claim it will.

Jonathan Wolf had the same question, to which the professor responded, “No, that is an observational association. It’s not evidence.”

To get true evidence, you’d have to randomly give half of a group of pregnant women dogs and not give the other half one.

That would be a “randomised intervention,” meaning scientists would add dogs into participants’ lives at random rather than simply looking at those who already have one.

Those who own a dog already could do so for external reasons that might affect the results (like having a bigger house and maybe being richer, or being more rural, etc.).

Dr. Lack says a true scientific trial on the topic is hard to do, though he hopes to run a randomised “Bow Wow study” one day.

However given the data we do have, Dr. Lack says, “At the moment, we just have observation, but they’re pretty compelling observations.”  

One such study found “that exposure to dogs and farm animals during the first year of life reduces the risk of asthma in children at age 6 years.” 

“This all goes back to the hygiene hypothesis, getting in contact with a whole host of bacterial flora,” the professor added. 

Is there any other way to reduce the risk of allergies?

Seemingly, yes (good news for those of us in small apartments or with dog allergies).

We’ve written before about an extensive study that found that giving children who are at risk of developing a peanut butter allergy the offending food regularly, especially when very young, seems to reduce allergy rates by 71%.

In the ZOE podcast, Dr. Lack talked about the same idea.

“I would say in babies with eczema as early as three to four months of life, start introducing them to peanut, egg, milk, the common food allergens,” he said. 

“Regularly, frequently, not large amounts of time, small amounts of time, but so that they get enough over a week and continue that every week,” he added. 

So, more dogs and more peanut butter sandwiches… sounds good to me.