MeDALL, a new project with the intention of understanding the epidemic allergy

Allergy, the epidemic of the 21st century worldwide, is a major health problem and needs to be prevented and better controlled. MeDALL, a new EU health project under the 7th Framework programme, has the intention of understanding the reasons for the increased prevalence of allergy observed in the past decades. From January 24th to 26th 2011 23 consortium members involved begin to work in this project during the kick-off meeting hold in PRBB, Barcelona, Spain.

This EU project is coordinated by the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Medicale (INSERM), Paris, France and the Centre for Research in Environmental Epidemiology (CREAL), Barcelona, Spain.

This project, funded with 11.9 million Euros, aims to understand the reasons for the increase of allergy cases (asthma, allergic rhinitis, atopic dermatitits and food allergy, particularly in children) observed in the last decades. To achieve this, MeDALL has the participation of a wide network of birth cohorts that have been studied in about 42,000 children. From these cohorts the study includes a wide range of approaches that range from epigenetics to biology systems.

As a part of this project, a series of seminars has been scheduled, which are open to scientists. In the first edition will address aspects related to the identification and characterization of new allergic phenotypes.