EGG ALLERGY IN CHILDREN<subtitle>Incidence and Evaluation in Relation to Chick-Embryo-Propagated Vaccines</subtitle>

EGG IN relation to the problem of food allergy is perhaps too well understood today to warrant more than passing comment. It assumes new interest, however, in its bearing on the increasing use of viral and rickettsial vaccines prepared from chick embryos. Clinical experience with such vaccines indicates that their use may be fraught with danger in those cases in which the patients are sensitive to egg. A study of the incidence and interpretation of egg sensitivity that may be encountered in a random population, as well as in allergic persons, is therefore pertinent. INCIDENCE OF EGG SENSITIVITY IN NONALLERGIC CHILDREN Normal persons have been tested with egg proteins to evaluate the significance of skin tests, and the general survey suggests an incidence of egg sensitivity of less than 1% in a random group of infants and children. Blackfan 1 found no positive reactors among 43 children tested with egg