16 January 2019: 

School and youth camps provide a great opportunity for young people to get away with friends and try new things. For young people with food allergy and their parents, camps can be a stressful experience as they rely on the knowledge of others to manage their food allergy and respond in an unlikely emergency.

The National Allergy Strategy 250K youth camp is the first camp to be conducted specifically for teens and young adults living with food allergy. Thirty young people from across Australia will be participating in the camp as part of the National Allergy Strategy’s 250K Youth Project funded by the Australian Government Department of Health.

The 250K youth camp aims to:

• bring teens and young adults with food allergy together to share their experiences and reduce social isolation and allow them to develop autonomy in managing their condition. 
• provide an opportunity for camp participants to have fun whilst still learning about managing their health condition. 
• provide an opportunity for camp participants can develop a sense of community, free of judgement without feeling like they are being singled out. 
• help camp participants to learn how others deal with managing their health condition and provide positive experiences about navigating unfamiliar social situations. 
• provide an opportunity for us to learn from young people so that we can engage more effectively with young people who live with potentially life-threatening allergies.

12 December 2018: 

All at the National Allergy Strategy are disappointed in having to cancel the December 2018 Kalgoorlie visit. Unfortunately, there was very limited interest demonstrated by local health professionals. The Kalgoorlie visit was part of a Shared Care Model project pilot which requires health professional engagement.  We were planning to send a team of 6 health professionals to Kalgoorlie for three days and had to no choice but to cancel as there were less than 10 health professionals (no doctors who were planning to attend an education session). We are planning to engage with health professionals in Kalgoorlie to learn more about what support they need.

2 November 2018: 

Today the National Allergy Strategy is hosting a food allergen management in food service round table in Sydney.

This meeting provides an opportunity for key stakeholders in food service to engage and discuss the next steps to improve food allergen management in food service.

The NAS Food service project team at left, and industry representatives took time out for a group photo.

1 November 2018: 

The National Allergy Strategy has partnered with Environmental Health Australia (EHA) to develop a resource hub to assist authorised officers to help improve food allergy management in food service.

The resource is being launched at the national EHA conference today in Perth.

www.foodallergytraining.org.au/resources-ao/

Sandra Vale, National Allergy Strategy Coordinator and Vic Andrich, WA president of Environmental Health Australia (WA Branch) shown at the launch.

27 August 2018: 

Today the National Allergy Strategy Food Allergy Prevention Project was launched in WA as the main pilot region for the Project. The Food Allergy Prevention Project is the first in the world to promote feeding children the common allergy causing foods by one year of age, to help prevent food allergy developing.

While previous food allergy prevention strategies included delayed introduction of common food allergens and avoidance of foods in pregnancy, the Food Allergy Prevention Project widely promotes the introduction of common food allergens. This includes peanut, tree nuts, cow’s milk, egg, wheat, fish, shellfish, sesame and soy, in the first year of life. The new recommendations will not prevent all food allergies but will help prevent food allergy developing in the majority of babies.

Studies show that babies with eczema may also develop food allergy by exposure to the food through their skin. The “Nip Allergies in the Bub” website developed by the Project contains practical information for parents and carers about introducing solid foods and managing eczema for allergy prevention in the first year of life. The website also contains information and resources specifically for health professionals, including e-training courses.

Visit: www.preventallergies.org.au

The National Allergy Strategy event on 16 August at Parliament House Canberra was a great success with Minister Hunt announcing five years of funding for the National Allergy Strategy.

Minister Greg Hunt, Minister Ken Wyatt, Senator Richard Di Natale and Catherine King MP all spoke of their support for the National Allergy Strategy.

Mr Barry Hickey and Ms Jaclyn Jauhiainen shared their personal experiences of living with severe allergy.

We would like to thank Minister Hunt, Minister Wyatt, Senator Richard Di Natale (Parliamentary Allergy Alliance Co-convenor), Catherine King, Tony Zappia MP (Parliamentary Allergy Alliance Co-convenor) and Russell Broadbent MP (Parliamentary Allergy Alliance Co-convenor) for their ongoing support of the National Allergy Strategy.

This is wonderful news for the many Australians living with allergic diseases.

We will continue to keep you informed as we progress the National Allergy Strategy initiatives.

Parliament House Canberra Event

16 August 2018: 

To celebrate the achievements of the National Allergy Strategy, a lunch time event “Implementing the National Allergy Strategy: From paper to practice” was held at Parliament House in Canberra today, 16 August 2018.

Minister Hunt, Senator Di Natale, Minister Wyatt and Catherine King MP spoke at the event along with National Allergy Strategy Co-chairs A/Prof Richard Loh and Ms Maria Said and two people living with allergic disease who shared their experiences, Ms Jaclyn Jauhiainen and Mr Barry Hickey. 

Development of the National Allergy Strategy has enabled the identification of strategies to improve and optimise the management of allergic disease and help prevent food allergy where possible. We continue to increase awareness of allergic disease nationwide in line with our mission to improve the health and wellbeing, and therefore the quality of life of individuals with allergic conditions and those who care for them.

See the media release: National progress in the management of allergies but more work to be done  

16 August 2018: 

$10 million dollars over five years required to continue important work

In the past two years the National Allergy Strategy has been implemented to support the 1 in 5 Australians affected by allergic disease. This important work has involved engaging with many stakeholder organisations, and has been possible due to funding support from the Australian Government. However, with allergic diseases among the fastest growing chronic conditions in Australia ongoing collaborations are key and funding support of the National Allergy Strategy is critical.

“The statistics regarding allergies in Australia are concerning and require serious attention. One in 10 infants now have a food allergy⁴ and food allergy induced anaphylaxis has doubled in the last 10 years,” said Associate Professor Richard Loh. “Sadly, there have been many near misses and preventable deaths related to food and drug allergy. Just recently a young girl lost her life due to an allergic reaction to dairy. We need to learn from these tragic events and implement processes to prevent them from occurring again.”

“The National Allergy Strategy was established to address the alarming statistics and improve the quality of life of all Australians living with allergic conditions. We are very thankful for the government support to date and input from many stakeholder groups.  This has enabled us to agree on priorities and make significant progress in important areas requiring national attention including food service training and engaging teenagers. It is crucial that we continue this ground-breaking work and we encourage the Australian Government to maintain their commitment. We require $10 million dollars over 5 years to ensure that we continue to progress the National Allergy Strategy implementation.”

 Senator Richard Di Natale supports the need for a national response.

“With more than 4 million Australians affected, we must have a coordinated, funded, national strategy and response. The risks are too great to ignore,” Dr Di Natale said. “This is a critically important strategy and it must be supported at the highest levels to make sure no more lives are lost to allergy.”