Boiling peanuts may stop allergic reaction, Flinders University researcher finds.

Image: ABC. By Brett Williamson.

Boiling peanuts for up to 12 hours could desensitise children to allergic reactions, according to findings made by Flinders University researcher Dr Billy Tao.

Dr Tao told 891 ABC Adelaide‘s Drive program that he was inspired by similar research conducted in the 1990s by researcher Kirsten Bayer.

“She noticed that children in China do not have many peanut allergy problems,” he said.

Dr Bayer believed low peanut allergies in Chinese children may have been caused by them eating boiled rather than roasted peanuts.

Dr Tao said the original tests by Dr Bayer saw peanuts boiled for 20 minutes before being given to infants and lower allergic reactions were recorded.

Dr Bayer’s research stalled after the initial finding and Dr Tao relaunched the trials four years ago.

“I suddenly realised I can actually desensitise peanut-allergic children using peanuts that have been boiled a lot longer than 20 minutes,” Dr Tao said.

“After partial protection from boiled peanuts, for say after eight months, you can then give them roasted peanuts and they are protected.”

Clinical trials are underway for treating mild to moderate allergy cases, with a method being developed for those with severe allergic reactions also.

How boiling peanuts reduces allergic reactions.

Dr Tao said that by boiling peanuts rather than roasting them, proteins that triggered allergic reactions were removed.

Boiling peanuts for up to 12 hours reduced proteins to a level where a patient’s immune system would not react.

“The main discovery is you need to boil peanuts for a lot longer than 20 minutes in order to achieve a significant level of hypoallergenicity,” Dr Tao said.

Not time to throw away your EpiPen.

Dr Tao stressed the research was still in its infancy, so people with allergies should not stop their current treatments.

“We are just trying to prove that there is a way to treat nut allergies around the corner,” he said.

Dr Tao said desensitisation could be temporary and that allergies could return for some.

He said self-administered trials should not be attempted.

“If you are desensitised it probably works well to keep eating [boiled peanuts] and be monitored regularly to make sure that you become tolerised,” he said.

This post originally appeared on ABC News.