An allergy is the term given to a condition where someone’s body reacts to something in an adverse way even though the substances that they body is reacting to are not generally harmful to the human body. This basically means that a person’s immune system mistakes a substance for something harmful and reacts in a way to protect the body from the perceived threat.
Usually the immune system protects the body from harmful substances like viruses or bacteria but when it attacks substances that are not generally harmful at all, these substances are termed allergens. An immune system that is oversensitive recognizes certain allergens as harmful and reacts to attack it by releasing chemicals like histamine. Histamine fights off the allergen but because the allergen is essentially harmless the body takes the brunt of the beating.
This results in overactive mucus production, swelling, itching, muscle spasms, rashes, hives, and other symptoms that can vary in extremity from person to person. Both allergens and the symptoms they cause vary from one person to the next. There may be a case where two people have the same allergy, such as peanuts, and in one person it causes a rash whereas for the other it is life-threatening. This means allergies have everything to do with the individual.
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