Why are these allergens added and what symptoms do they cause? What is it about these additives that alcohol producers consider essential enough to risk the well-being of millions of American food allergy sufferers? As it turns out, it depends on the allergen. Some are simply more dangerous than others.
So Long, Sulfites
Sulfites caused a major outcry in the 1980s. After several studies found that inhaling and ingesting sulfites could be deadly to asthmatics, the FDA began a regulation campaign that successfully curbed annual sulfite deaths to the single digits. All wines and beers containing more than 10 parts per million of sulfites are required to mention them on their product label.
According to the FDA, roughly 1 percent of people in the United States are sulfite-sensitive, almost all of them asthmatic. It's estimated that 5 percent of all asthmatics have sulfite sensitivities.
 Taylor Richardson, a 28-year-old office manager from Boise, Idaho, is an allergic asthmatic who exhibits a bad reaction to wine. "I get bright red blotches down my neck and chest, like hives," she says. "My face gets red, hot and a little itchy. After about a third to a half glass of wine, my throat starts to close."
Her reaction may be caused either by sulfites which occur naturally during winemaking or by sulfites, such as sodium metabisulfite (SMB) and potassium metabisulfate (PMB), which are artificially added to conventional wines and beers. SMB, a common beer preservative, causes reactions in about 4 percent of people with sulfite sensitivities. PMB is used as a preservative in both beer and wine, and is preferred because it doesn't add to a drink's sodium content. Both PMB and SMB are known to trigger reactions in sensitive people, ranging from runny nose to anaphylaxis.
Organic and biodynamic wines, produced using no artificial pesticides or preservatives, are only allowed 100 ppm of naturally-occurring sulfites—and no added sulfites. Most conventional wines contain up to 350 ppm.
No big deal, according to Mimi Gatens, director of sustainability at Benziger Winery. "The levels of sulfites found in a bottle of wine are less than those found in a bottle of prescription medication," she says. "Without the use of sulfites, flavors can move quickly from fruit to nutty to cardboard to vinegar."
Both naturally-occurring and artificial sulfites essentially dissipate over time, says Fred Freitag, D.O., of the Diamond Headache Clinic in Chicago. "The sulfites naturally produced in organic wines are so volatile in a corked bottle that most of them will escape during storage." The same goes for artificial preservatives PMB and SMB. "In solution, these turn into hydrogen sulfite or other salts and dissipate…becoming essentially stale within three months," Freitag says.
For that reason, and because of how rare sulfite allergies are, doctors are quick to discount them during diagnosis. "I'll ask a patient complaining of an adverse reaction what he or she ate and drank when (the reaction) occurred," says Dan Atkins, M.D., pediatrician at the National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine in Denver, Colorado. "If beer or wine doesn't seem to be the problem, I tend to dismiss sulfite sensitivity."
Histamines and Tannins:
The Headache-Makers
If you're not sensitive to sulfites, a host of other factors could be causing your wine or beer reaction. Histamines and tannins are two naturally-occurring elements commonly indicted in reactions, especially headaches.
Ahna Olana, a 61-year-old therapist from Louisville, Colorado, gets such bad headaches from wine that she now drinks sparkling pear juice instead. "When I drink wine…I will almost always get a killer migraine either later that day or the next," she says. Headaches are hardly uncommon. As many as 80 percent of migraine sufferers'symptoms are triggered by red wines.
Tannins are flavenoids that add a bitter flavor to red wine and also prevent oxidation as wine ages. They're found in grape skins, stems and seeds, and sometimes they leach into wine from oak storage barrels. Ingesting tannins increases the amount of feel-good chemical serotonin in the blood. High serotonin levels are known to cause headaches.
Histamines, which come from grape skins, are strongly indicted in red wine headaches. They're part of a family of known migraine triggers called amines, which include common migraine culprits, such as cheese, chocolate and cured meat. Histamines also form during the beer-making process. Dark beers, such as porters, are often rich in the compound.
People who react to the histamine in alcohol may also have low levels of an intestinal enzyme called diamine oxidase, which normally processes histamine without causing symptoms. Insufficient quantity of this enzyme causes people to experience strong headaches, a runny nose or flushing—symptoms similar to a seasonal allergy. In fact, if you have seasonal allergies, the histamines in alcohol might make them worse.
"I have a bad allergy to mold and cannot drink red wine when I'm in moldy climates. I get a very strong histamine reaction," says Tamara Greenleaf, a 40-year-old marketing executive from Portland, Oregon.
Greenleaf's symptoms are indicative of something allergists call cross-reactivity. "With some foods, an allergy to one food or substance may render sensitivity to other foods or substances in the same classification," says Clifford Basset, M.D., of Allergy and Asthma Care of New York. Histamine-rich red wine, therefore, might make some peoples' seasonal allergies worse. "If you have seasonal allergies, avoiding red wine might be a good idea," says Seif Shaheen, M.D., Ph.D, of King's College, London. |
