What is PAFA?
Patterns and Prevalence of Adult Food Allergy (PAFA) is a research project that aims to find out how many adults in the UK have food allergies or intolerances.
We are carrying out this study so we can help improve policies and treatments for these people.
We want to learn more about:
- allergy that starts in childhood and continues into adulthood
- allergy that begins in adulthood
- different reactions that adults have to foods they are allergic or intolerant to
PAFA is funded by the Food Standards Agency, a government department that makes sure food is safe and what it says it is.
The project is a partnership between the Universities of Manchester, Southampton and Amsterdam University Medical Centre, with NHS partners in Manchester, Southampton and the Isle of Wight.
Our team
The University of Manchester
- Professor Clare Mills (overall project leader)
- Professor Angela Simpson (overall clinical chief investigator)
- Professor Arpana Verma (epidemiology and public health)
- Dr Phil Couch (health informatics platform)
- Dr Hui Guo (data analytics)
The University of Southampton
- Professor Graham Roberts (co-lead for the project and lead for the cohort studies)
- Professor Hasan Arshad (co-lead for the community study)
Amsterdam University Medical Centre
- Professor Ronald van Ree (project lead for molecular allergology)
Why we’re doing this research
Currently, many people with allergies are told to avoid the foods they are allergic or intolerant to.
This is not always easy for people to do. It can also be expensive if they have to buy special allergen-free foods.
Because this kind of research hasn’t been done for more than 25 years, we don’t know if and how food allergies and intolerance among adults have changed since the early 1990s.
Carrying out this study will help us to update our data and find ways to make food allergy policies and treatments better for the adults who need them.
What the study involves
There are two parts to our research.
1. Survey
We will look at food allergy patterns in adults in Manchester, Southampton and the Isle of Wight.
We will conduct a survey of adults aged between 18 and 70 years old to do this.
2. Previous studies
We will look at data from various allergy studies that have already taken place.
We will see if there have been any changes in food allergy patterns among the participants since they originally took part in those studies.
More information
More information about our study can be found in the following documents.
- General information (PDF)
- PAFA Stage 1: Participant information sheet (PDF)
- PAFA Stage 2: Participant information sheet (PDF)
- How PAFA will use your information (PDF)
Contact us
Please get in touch if you have any questions about the PAFA project.
Email: pafastudy@manchester.ac.uk
Contact Us
+44 (0) 161 306 6000
