Red wines in winter, whites in summer for hayfever sufferers

Red wines in winter, whites in summer, may be sensible for hayfever sufferers

As the UK enters the second grass pollen peak, with hayfever sufferers full of histamine, is it time to switch to white wines.

Hayfever is an allergic reaction to pollen. Grass and oak pollen are particularly bad and early June is typically the UK second peak of hay fever. Our bodies overreact to pollen by producing histamines that cause a running nose itchy eyes. But the wine you drink can add histamines to the body, increasing the effects of hayfever.

DrinkWell UK state that red wine can contain 20% to 200% more histamine than white wines. As a general guide, red wine may have anywhere from 60mg - 3,800mg of histamine. White wine has around 3mg - 120mg and Champagne has between 15mg-670mg of histamine.

Histamines can be influenced by the yeast and bacterias used to produce the wines, but much of the histamines are from the grape skins, so red wines which typically have much more skin contact to extract colour and tannins will have higher histamine levels. The easiest way to identify wines with high histamine levels is wines deep in colour and high in tannins.

For those of you who suffer with hayfever reds in winter and whites in summer is a smart way of helping yourself.