Sunday, September 20, 2009

Sign In A Classroom Window

"No peanuts or mangoes"

Interesting allergies out there....

5 comments:

maxutils said...

as one with a latex allergy -- (minor, thankfully, for reasons you can imagine) mangoes and avacdos are two things I'm supposed to avoid. I don't, but still -- latex allergies are common enough that hospitals don't use latex gloves anymore.

Darren said...

Mangoes and avocados are made of latex??

maxutils said...

Exceptionally similar chemical composition. I didn't believe it either. Peaches and strawberries, too. I eat them all, with no problem.

Anonymous said...

In a sense. Both mango and avocado trees produce a substance, referred to as latex, that protects a cut in the tree. Directions for grafting explicitly state that one should "remove the latex" from the cut.

More directly, mangoes and avocados contain proteins (the chitinase enzymes) which are very similar in structure to those responsible for latex allergies. Consequently, people who are allergic to latex are counseled to avoid mangoes and avocados. (Cf. R. Asero, G. Mistrello, D. Roncarolo, S. Amato, and P. Falagiani, "Detection of novel latex allergens associated with clinically relevant allergy to plant-derived foods,"
Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Volume 115, Issue 6, Pages 1312-1314).

maxutils said...

Better explanation than from my doctor. Gloves bother me, condoms don't. Might be duration . . . ;)