Recent Developments in Risk Assessment of Food Allergens

Risk assessment of food allergens has made an enormous development during the last decade. Dpending on the risk management question and goal, different approaches can be followed in risk assessment, which is also the case in food allergen risk assessment. Particular for population risk management purposes, probabilistic quantitative risk assessment is nowadays considered the most appropriate approach. Probabilistic quantitative risk assessment was first proposed and developed for food allergen risk assessment by TNO, The Netherlands, and has been used in the development of the current Voluntary Incidental Trace Allergen Labeling (VITAL^® 2.0) guidance of the Australian-New Zealand Allergen Bureau and for the quantification of risks of (possible) unintended allergen presence in food products. The approach provides many advantages over other approaches and many different applications are possible, like for instance to assess and compare the efficacy of various management options in reducing the risks of allergens in food chains. However, the approach also depends on stakeholder's ability to deal with risks. Some background on the need for and principles of probabilistic risk assessment in food allergy as well as some examples of its application and interpretation will be presented and discussed.