You Might Have Fewer Allergies If You Ate More Dirt

The title sounds like clickbait. It's not. There's substantial evidence that early-life exposure to dirt, dust, animals, and microbes significantly reduces the risk of developing allergies and asthma. This isn't fringe science—it's the hygiene hypothesis, supported by decades of epidemiological and immunological research.

I'm not advocating eating mud pies or abandoning hand washing after using the bathroom. The medical profession's adoption of hand washing in the mid-1800s dramatically reduced maternal and infant mortality from puerperal fever. Ignaz Semmelweis, the physician who proposed that doctors wash their hands between autopsies and deliveries, was ridiculed by his colleagues, institutionalized, and died shortly after—only to have his theories validated posthumously as germ theory became accepted.

Hygiene matters. But our modern obsession with sterilizing every surface, eliminating all bacterial exposure, and using antimicr...

What are allergies?
By J. J. Gregor DC, DIBAK, DCCN

It's allergy season again here in North Texas.  I’ve been told since I moved here 14 years ago that there are two types of people here: those who have allergies and those who will get allergies.   

Growing up in West Virginia, I experienced horrible sniffling, sneezing, sinus headaches, you name it, for a week every spring and every fall.  What's crazy is that when I moved to Dallas, all my allergies 'went away'.  So, why when I moved to one of the worst allergy prone places in the US, I suddenly felt my best? 

Allergies are an immune response or reaction to specific substances.  Allergens are all around us and are particularly problematic in the spring with trees budding out, flowers blooming, grass being cut and tons of pollen flying through the air.  And in Fall, it's the budding of other seasonal plants and the sap moving in trees. 

Conservatively 10 to 20% of the population of the U.S. suffer from some seasonal allergy at var...