Moisturising newborns prevents allergies: study

Whatever happened to trying to do things as nature intended? I can understand if the baby has a skin condition, but is this worth the risk to do to every baby all the time?

Scipantiest

Nature "intends" nearly 1/5 of all babies to dies before they reach the age of one.

Skrew nature.

I wonder which big name cosmetic company is behind this study and will 'just happen to have' the exact perfect moisturizer for babies on sale. This study is such a crock. Allergies are INCREASING, not decreasing, and they didn't have all these moisturizers long ago. I'm pretty sure that on the contrary, having a baby come to depend on external moisturizers while still ingesting whatever helps cause some allergies is NOT going to help it later in life, but create worse skin conditions for lack of the body's inability to fight things naturally. It's the same with increasing germ resistance due to overuse of medicines (and again, the rise in allergies).

you could flip a coin 47 times and easily see 19 tails vs 28 heads land just due to the nature of probability. In a study this small (only 59 babies each??) to suggest that small of a difference had anything to do with moisturizing is hardly convincing. Maybe if you showed me a difference of 0 vs 30, it would be enough to be convincing even in such a small study.

Apparently the problem is that we are too clean these days. Too much soap and such is used so the skin actually becomes weaker. Also the environment helps create allergies. Hence in developing countries where kids are living in poverty, skin problems are much more uncommon than in developed countries. A bit of dirt and so on toughens the skin up.

The institute said in a release that emollient prevents skin from drying out and cracking, which exposes immune cells and allows irritants to get in.

Moisturizers can reduce the skin barrier function, allowing penetration. I wonder if they looked at this.

Allergies are INCREASING, not decreasing, and they didn't have all these moisturizers long ago

You miss the point. Yes, allergies are on the rise due to the reasons serendipitous has mentioned. This study has shown that using moisturizers can help reduce allergies for babies now. The absence of moisturizers in the past has nothing to do with it. Regardless, using moisturizers after bathing your baby is a good idea. We did so with both our ours and so far they have no allergies, no skin conditions.

Interesting. So a newborn humans need a moisturizer ... right! Hmmm ... sounds like the basis for a revenue channel targeted at gullible first time mothers.

And results are from such a large study - '28 in the control group'. Ok ... something to think about...

A newborn's microbiota does this job already when a natural equilibrium is encouraged and maintained.

Mothers give viable healthy symbiotic organisms to children during natural childbirth and reinforce this during breastfeeding. This acts to prevent allergic reaction internally and externally.

Natural breastfeeding strengthens the immune system by feeding a child's natural internal external microbiota.

These outcomes are in endocrine and other studies that have found a causal link and this emerging information is growing exponentially.

Keywords for searching our natural flora just use google scholar are; microbiota, microbiome, gut flora, 'microbial metabolites' intestinal immune homeostasis'

What? Does it mean that in Japan about 28 out 59 people get eczema? That is almost 50%. I really doubt it.

The 18th, 19th and 20th centuries.

I see. The centuries that gave us the ability to take out most life on earth and provided some marginal life extension.

We don't live a natural lifestyle anymore. We live in airconditioned environments with city air full of irritants and pollutants.

Baby oil (a moisturiser!! OMG!!) has been used by parents for decades. There is no conspiracy here, just research backing up that what parents have been doing for decades has a medical basis.

I think the headline is misleading. The study as described here shows that moisturizing reduces the incidence of atopic dermatitis among babies. Atopic dermatitis is quite common in babies. Most babies who have this condition get over it and don't go on to suffer allergies when older. What is not clear is whether those babies who responded to the use of moisturizers would have been among the group that would have gone on to suffer from allergies.

kickboard: "You miss the point. Yes, allergies are on the rise due to the reasons serendipitous has mentioned."

I don't miss the point at all, and in fact serendipitous is saying basically the same thing as I did -- that overuse of things like this, medication, ingestion of chemicals and said medicines, and yes, being over-clean and too afraid to get a little dirty (which falls into the abuse of medicines and the like; bacterial clothes, wet naps, masks all the time, etc.). I have in the past commented plenty on this, talking about mothers who constantly wipe their kids hands at parks, using too many liquid soaps and detergents and then moisturizers, 'minus ion' steam machines, and all sorts of make-up or creams with 'revitalizing' agents being the reason why things like eczema, psoriasis, and other skin ailments and allergies exist.

"This study has shown that using moisturizers can help reduce allergies for babies now. The absence of moisturizers in the past has nothing to do with it."

The study was of an extremely small group and really proves nothing, and as I said will only harm them and make them more reliant on such things in the future if they can't be made to tough it out now, and the absence of moisturizers in the past but their presence now is again an example of abuse of products in general.

"Regardless, using moisturizers after bathing your baby is a good idea. We did so with both our ours and so far they have no allergies, no skin conditions."

Glad to hear it, but can you say that is the reason or has absolutely anything to do with it? I know you can't, but just for the heck of it can you ballpark how much you've spent on the moisturizers? If further studies, and better yet long term ones, can prove that there's a causal relationship, or heck even if it just gives you peace of mind and you WANT to believe it, then there is of course no meaning to money at all over your children's lives, but I'm just curious.

Now, that said, I can see applying moisturizer in the form of NATURAL remedies (aloe, for example) -- no over the counter stuff, and I honestly think the latter is part of what this study is trying to push. Who funded the study?

if the two groups were separated and nothing happened to each group, you could have had the same results. We don't know. Does the same rate of eczema uptake occur without the moisturizer? It's not as if 100% of babies develop eczema either. Given the study size and lack of comparisons this really doesn't mean anything. They found that kids playing in dirt inhibit allergies too. Maybe cover your baby in dirt then?

Or not

Newborn skin tends to crack, dry and flake in the first few weeks of life. Mine all looked like lizards for a while. I moisturised them for that reason. One is allergic to cats, one has nothing, and the other had mild eczema - which I suspect would have been much worse had I not moisturised him.

I dont know if it helps or not, but common sense suggests it would, and I have seen some truly horrendous allergic skin conditions in Japan so if baby oil cant hurt, why not try?

agree this is more like a business driven study. the amount of parabens and other undesirable chemicals in most moisturisers are enough to ensure the baby grow up with allergies. a new born child properly nourished and covered with proper clothing will need minimal external moisturising. if parents have to moisturise the baby, please understand the ingredients before applying them and getting hooked to a life long career for the medical industry.