Hay fever season is upon us, which goes without saying if you’re one of the 26% of people who suffer from seasonal allergies and are already sneezing.

The biggest bugbear with hay fever is that there’s not a lot that actually eases your symptoms. You can keep the windows closed, check the pollen count and wash your hair more often, but you may still find you have itchy eyes and a runny nose. Over-the-counter medicines can also help, but many antihistamines can lead you to feel drowsy.

Like many conditions, diet is often heralded as the solution to improved symptoms. Can nutrition play a role in beating hay fever? “More research is needed to confirm that the things we eat have an impact on hay fever,” says Rhiannon Lambert, nutritionist and founder of Rhitrition. However, she does say that there are certain foods that may help some people shake off their allergy symptoms during the high pollen season. 

Vitamin E

“Some evidence suggests a diet that includes foods rich in vitamin E may be protective against hay fever,” says Lambert. A review in Clinical & Experimental Allergy found that vitamin E can suppress the cascade of immune activation, reducing the reaction to allergens. Another paper found that while vitamin E supplementation didn’t reduce the number of days participants were impacted by hay fever, it did reduce nasal symptoms. 

If you want to add more vitamin E to your diet, try some of these foods:

• almonds
• avocados
• sunflower seeds
• Atlantic salmon
• red pepper
• mango

Vitamin C

“Research has also suggested higher intakes of vitamin C in children can help reduce hay fever symptoms too. This may be in part due to their antioxidant properties and their role in our immune health,” says Lambert.

Studies show that when levels of vitamin C are too low, there’s a rise in histamine – the compound released by immune cells that can lead to allergy symptoms. Increasing levels of vitamin C is also associated with a reduction in histamine. 

Stock up on these vitamin C-rich foods:

• citrus fruits
• kiwis
• strawberries
• tomatoes
• cabbage
• broccoli

Honey

Those hyping up manuka may not be so wrong. “More research is needed to fully understand the benefits of the consumption of honey in the prevention and management of hay fever, but some limited evidence from randomised controlled trials have found that daily ingestion of certain types of honey, alongside allergy medication, helped to improve hay fever symptoms after four weeks,” says Lambert.

That study, from 2013, found honey and antihistamines had a better effect than antihistamines alone. According to the old wives’ tale, honey prevents allergy because bees use pollen to create honey, and some research does support that claim. 

A paper from the International Archives Of Allergy and Immunology showed that patients with birch pollen allergy who consumed honey-containing birch pollen prior to the onset of the pollen season had a significant improvement in symptoms and a reduction in the use of antihistamines. It’s not the most robust study, but for those who aren’t vegan it might be worth trying honey before and during the hay fever months.

There’s no research specifically showing that honey needs to be local to you, despite the myth suggesting it will build immunity to local pollen. In a 2002 study, participants ate generic honey or local honey and neither had any change in their symptoms. And no research shows whether manuka honey is better than regular honey when it comes to hay fever, but studies do show that manuka has more antioxidants and minerals, which might make it better at fighting allergies. Either way, a spoonful of honey might just stop the symptoms after all. 

Images: Getty