Here is surprising news:sucking your thumb or biting your nails would lead to less risk of developing allergies! Indeed, according to a New Zealand study, published in the journal Pediatrics , these two habits, however bad, would not only have harmful consequences.
To carry out their work, American and New Zealand researchers followed the evolution of 1,000 children aged 5, 7.9 and 11 years old. Among them, 31% used to suck their thumb or bite their nails. When they reached the ages of 13 and 32, the children volunteered to test their body's reactions to a number of allergens. And the result is astonishing:at age 13, 38% of children who sucked their thumbs or bit their nails were sensitive to allergies compared to 49% of children who neither bit their nails nor sucked their thumb. As for those who had combined the two habits, their chances were even lower of developing allergies (31%). And this observation was also confirmed at the age of 32. In 2013, another study published in the journal Pediatrics was also broadly in the same direction. But this time, Swedish researchers confirmed the virtues of the transmission of microbes between parents and children. Thus, a pacifier cleaned with the saliva of the parents would develop fewer allergies than if it had been rinsed with water. Be careful, however, scientists are unanimous on one point:if excessive cleanliness can promote the development of allergies, it is not a question of advocating a total absence of hygiene either. So it's all about balance.
Either way, good to know!
