The prevalence of current selfreported peanut allergy (PA) is 2.9% among US adults, according to a study published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. Study investigators administered a cross-sectional food allergy survey by phone and Web in 2015 and 2016 (resulting in nationally representative complex-survey weighted data for 40,443 adults) to calculate the current population-level burden of adult PA in the US. Of the 2.9% of adults who self-reported PA, 1.8% reported convincing PA. Onset of PA in adulthood was reported by more than 17.0% of adults with PA. Physician-diagnosed PA was reported by 75.4% of adults with childhooddiagnosed PA, compared with 58.9% with adultonset PA. Adults with childhood-onset PA were significantly more likely to have a current epinephrine prescription (56% vs 44%) and to use an epinephrine autoinjector (48% vs 35%) than those with adult-onset PA, although the frequency of food allergy-related emergency department visits within the past year was similar (about one in five adults with PA).
