This is nuts.

[stevew]

Parents want child with peanut allergy removed from school




Parents in Edgewater, Fl., protest a public school's extraordinary efforts to create a peanut-free environment.
A 6-year-old girl at a school in Florida has a peanut allergy so severe that she could have a reaction if she were to breath traces of nut dust in the air. Her elementary school in Edgewater, Fl., has taken extraordinary measures to accommodate her.

All students are now required to wash their hands and rinse out their mouths before stepping inside the classroom. Desks must be regularly wiped down with Clorox wipes. School administrators have banned all peanut products and snacks are no longer allowed in the class. Earlier this month, a peanut-sniffing dog walked through the school to make sure everyone is following the rules.

The school is legally obligated to take these safety precautions because of the Federal Disabilities Act, according to Nancy Wait, the the spokeswoman for Volusia County Schools.

"It would be the same thing as putting a handicap ramp for a student that is physically disabled. The only difference with this is that is affects other students," Wait told FoxNews.com.

A group of parents are outraged by the new requirements and protested outside the school holding signs emblazoned with phrases expressing their frustration: "What's next? Where does this end?" Parents feel that the new requirements are taking up to 30 minute out of the students' school day. They are asking the district to require that the girl with the allergies be home-schooled.

The girl and her family are deeply hurt by the protests. "We've fought very hard to put certain things in place to keep her alive in school," David Bailey, the father of the student with the allergy, told My Fox Orlando. "She's already a cast-out. She can't do most things kids can do."


Food allergies in children on the rise

Some 3 million children have food allergies, most commonly to peanuts, seafood, eggs, milk, and soy. The prevalence in kids has risen 18 percent in the past 10 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As more children are diagnosed with allergies, more schools are faced with figuring out how to deal with students requiring special treatment. Some schools adopt nut bans, while others implement less strict rules, for example, allowing peanut butter sandwiches while creating nut-free tables where students with allergies can eat snack and lunch.

Just how far a school should go to protect a child with a food allergy is a matter of debate.

Some experts feel that it's absolutely necessary to do everything possible for a child who could have a life-threatening reaction by simply touching someone who ate peanuts. Schools are often forced to take this side in order to protect themselves from lawsuits.

Other medical experts believe that doctors are over-diagnosing food allergies. They also think that nut bans are an over-reaction to the magnitude of the threat. Dr. Nicholas Christakis, a professor of medical sociology at Harvard Medical School, presents some compelling stats backing up this argument in a 2008 story for the British Medical Journal:

Serious allergic reactions to foods cause just 2,000 hospitalizations a year (out of more than 30 million hospitalizations nationwide). And only 150 people (children and adults) die each year from all food allergies combined. Compare that number with the 50 people who die each year from bee stings, the 100 who die from lightning strikes, and the 45,000 who die in motor vehicle collisions. Or compare it with the 10,000 hospitalizations of children each year for traumatic brain injuries acquired during sports or the 2,000 who drown or the roughly 1300 who die from gun accidents.
Yes, these numbers are convincing and make nut bans seem silly, but when you have a parent who has been told by a doctor that her child might die from eating peanuts that 150 number still seems high.

How should schools deal with students' food allergies?

Posted By: Amy Graff (Email, Twitter, Facebook) | March 22 2011 at 12:53 PM

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Parents want child with peanut allergy removed from school : The Mommy Files (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfmoms/detail?entry_id=85498)

[CrimsonFox]

I think kids have always had allergies. Always have and will. Just we're more testing-crazy nowadays. The whole gluten thing and all that. I'm not saying that it's not valid but I also think it doesn't mean as much. Now for peanuts, that's a really serious allergy in some. That girl actually would actually GET an education if she were homeschooled

[RainMaker]

Florida

[RainMaker]

I think kids have always had allergies. Always have and will. Just we're more testing-crazy nowadays. The whole gluten thing and all that. I'm not saying that it's not valid but I also think it doesn't mean as much. Now for peanuts, that's a really serious allergy in some. That girl actually would actually GET an education if she were homeschooled

Hygiene hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis)

[Gary Gorski]

I think kids have always had allergies. Always have and will. Just we're more testing-crazy nowadays. The whole gluten thing and all that. I'm not saying that it's not valid but I also think it doesn't mean as much. Now for peanuts, that's a really serious allergy in some. That girl actually would actually GET an education if she were homeschooled

I don't know why kids today seem to have more allergies or fiercer reactions to them but the gluten thing is legit. When our son was two he began getting sores that would not heal and were excruciatingly painful for him. Nobody had any answers for us until we finally gave up the "regular" doctor route and took him to a homeopathic doctor. The first thing she suggested was getting him tested for a gluten allergy. When she said that we had no idea what gluten even was - got him tested, found out he's allergic to gluten, milk and corn so we immediately took him off of it and within a week the sores healed and never came back and that was after months and months of them being there and worsening daily. He's six now and never had the problem again - its not cheap or easy to feed him in some cases but to see the pain he was in at such a young age I'm very thankful we found someone who figured it out.

[RainMaker]

Have you had him allergy tested by a real doctor? Homeopathic "doctors" tend to run tests that are highly inaccurate when it comes to that stuff. Not saying the results are flawed, but with the odds that someone is allergic to all 3 of those being so miniscule, you may want to get a second opinion from a real doctor.

Not saying they are wrong or anything, but I know the anti-gluten craze has gotten a little ridiculous. I have friends who will only buy gluten-free bread and stuff and they don't have Coeliac disease or anything. They've just been told that gluten is somehow horrible for people. A lot of that stuff takes out some of the healthiest parts of bread.

[CrimsonFox]

Hygiene hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis)


Well that sure makes sense.

[Solecismic]

I have a friend who has a gluten allergy. It was diagnosed in her 30s. Changed her life. She's very, very careful about what she eats now, and feels great.

I'm familiar with the peanut rules. There's a list of children in my son's school, with specific allergies and how bad they are and what to do, right down to where that child's inhaler is located if something happens. It's posted in the cafeteria, among other places. We are sent a list of specific snacks we can and can not let them bring to school. People take this seriously, the parents don't complain. My son's a vegetarian, so taking nuts out of his diet is a semi-big deal, but even he doesn't complain.

I cannot even begin to fathom why it takes 30 minutes a day to create a safe environment for this child. The peanut-sniffing dog sounds like an SNL parody - and what will the school do if the dog sets off a serious allergy?

It sounds like the principal isn't all that bright, and needs to meet with a doctor and the kid's parents, so they can come up with a safe plan that doesn't require so much disruption.

[SteveMax58]

she could have a reaction if she were to breath traces of nut dust in the air.

My wife tries to use this BS excuse all the time.

[Gary Gorski]

Have you had him allergy tested by a real doctor? Homeopathic "doctors" tend to run tests that are highly inaccurate when it comes to that stuff. Not saying the results are flawed, but with the odds that someone is allergic to all 3 of those being so miniscule, you may want to get a second opinion from a real doctor.

Not saying they are wrong or anything, but I know the anti-gluten craze has gotten a little ridiculous. I have friends who will only buy gluten-free bread and stuff and they don't have Coeliac disease or anything. They've just been told that gluten is somehow horrible for people. A lot of that stuff takes out some of the healthiest parts of bread.

This woman was a "real doctor" - she was a MD that practiced for over 40 years and was a graduate of U of M. Its just that her approach was to look for something that may be causing the problem rather than just telling us to put cream X on the sores and see what happens like the third "real doctor" we saw told us to. In fact like I said three "real doctors" had no clue what the problem was and really didn't try very hard to figure it out other than prescribing something. And either she was right or it was a pretty awesome coincidence that after having these sores that would not heal for six months of time that they healed within a week of taking him off gluten.

We don't feel that gluten is horrible for people - the rest of our family still eats gluten (I can't imagine the food bill to feed six of us on what the gluten-free stuff costs). Personally I wonder if some of my random stomach issues are caused by gluten but I like the food I eat too much to try and transition to a gluten free diet :) My son on the other hand started this when he was two so he really doesn't know any different but he's happy, has nearly any food we can think of available to him and most importantly is healthy so we're sticking with the gluten free diet for him.

[JPhillips]

My wife tries to use this BS excuse all the time.

Gold, Jerry. Gold I tell ya.

[NorvTurnerOverdrive]

Hygiene hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis)
i buy it. i used to be deathly allergic to cat hair and dust but thanks to my habitual dating of cat hoarders and my unwillingness to clean i've conquered both.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Been there, on a lesser scale, done that.

I understand how much of an annoyance this sort of thing can become, pretty much became a roll-eyes topic at my son's last school. Problem was exacerbated by the holier-than-thou physician parent of the student in question, who demanded & received a 30-minute lecture time at a parent-teacher night. Went over like a lead balloon, even with a largely touchy-feely crowd.

We tried to be reasonably accommodating (don't send peanut butter cookies for lunch, avoid sending peanuts when it was our turn in the send-snacks-for-all bubble) but didn't invest a whole lot of energy into parsing every single thing that went to school with our son either.

[tyketime]

My wife tries to use this BS excuse all the time.
:bowdown:

[Gary Gorski]

We tried to be reasonably accommodating (don't send peanut butter cookies for lunch, avoid sending peanuts when it was our turn in the send-snacks-for-all bubble) but didn't invest a whole lot of energy into parsing every single thing that went to school with our son either.

I think that's fair though - at some point people have to accept reasonably accommodating because you cannot structure things simply for one person no matter what it is. If someone is that severely allergic I would think the parents would not want her in a school situation for her own safety.

I also don't agree with the line from her father about her being a "cast-out" and I'm surprised that her father would feel that way. Just because she has an allergy, even if it is a severe one, does not make her a cast-out. She can't have friends or be in social situations because she's allergic to peanuts? I'm assuming their home is peanut-free, why can't she be homeschooled and invite friends over to an environment where her parents know there is not the danger of peanuts or peanut dust being present? Instead of focusing on everything she can't do or can't eat and instead of focusing on trying to get everyone else in the school to upend their lives to accommodate them why don't they focus their energy and time on finding the ways to adjust their lives to try and make things as "normal" as possible for her.

I guess its just my opinion but if my child's allergies were so severe that just a trace of dust could set off a reaction I wouldn't be leaving the responsibility that she is an environment free of that open to a bunch of random people who are all very busy with their own children and lives and could very easily forget to think about it. As parents we are responsible for our children and for some people that means a hell of a lot of extra work and sacrifice than for others. Maybe its not fair, maybe its extra expense or extra time spent or extra hassle but that's the way it is.

[Autumn]

We have a friend who has a child who is deathly allergic to peanuts, milk and eggs. Fortunately, I guess, for his school she chose to homeschool him. Because as ludicrous as some of that stuff above sounds, it's necessary. She knows if she sent him to school there's nothing they could do to actually keep him safe. Even their family can't manage to be strict enough with the precautions to keep him from having reactions when they see him. For example a cousin or somebody he met gave him a play kiss or something on the cheek, and since she'd had cream cheese that morning at breakfast, he had a serious reaction.

We are some of the only people who are careful enough to be able to visit them. We have our kids take a bath the night before we see him, we don't eat anything with nuts, dairy or eggs the day that we see him, have them wash their hands when they get to his house. We have to make sure they wear clothing that has just been washed, don't bring any of their toys in with them, etc. He has to wear gloves whenever he goes out in public because he'll react to touching things that people have touched after eating food he's allergic to, like playground equipment or library books.

So the stuff is no joke, and unfortunately these parents have to choose between homeschooling or forcing schools to go through hugely extensive things to keep their child from dying. I've seen first hand that most people aren't willing to really follow the guidelines carefully, so unfortunately even doing all these things isn't going to necessarily help.

[Autumn]

I also don't agree with the line from her father about her being a "cast-out" and I'm surprised that her father would feel that way. Just because she has an allergy, even if it is a severe one, does not make her a cast-out. She can't have friends or be in social situations because she's allergic to peanuts? I'm assuming their home is peanut-free, why can't she be homeschooled and invite friends over to an environment where her parents know there is not the danger of peanuts or peanut dust being present? Instead of focusing on everything she can't do or can't eat and instead of focusing on trying to get everyone else in the school to upend their lives to accommodate them why don't they focus their energy and time on finding the ways to adjust their lives to try and make things as "normal" as possible for her.

I can speak from my friend's experience that yes, it's very hard for her child not to be socially isolated because of his allergies. As i wrote before, a kid touching him that has had peanut butter that morning, hours and hours later, and even after being washed up in between, can send him into a reaction. There are very few parents who she can trust to be careful enough to really keep her kid safe, and that greatly limits his opportunities for interaction. Lots and lots of people just don't take it seriously, and I've watched him breaking out at his birthday party because his own grandparents couldn't be bothered not to eat cream cheese that morning, or because they won't read labels carefully enough to know which bread is safe to eat.

I don't know anything about the family in the story, but it's not hard at all for me to think that the child might feel isolated. Imagine never being able to go over to a friend's house. Our friend's child has never been able to come to our kids' birthday parties unless we have it outside at some safe place. They can't go to the library, or most playgrounds. He can't go trick or treating. And until you know a kid with a food allergy you don't realize how freely most adults and kids will hand food to someone without asking the parent first.

[JonInMiddleGA]

or because they won't read labels carefully enough to know which bread is safe to eat.

Grandparents are one thing but for the more general public, I'd say that'd be asking a hell of a lot of bother. Most folks don't have time to read things they want to read, much less study the ingredient list connected to every f'n allergy and then study everything they eat/touch/encounter in order to accommodate those. Yes, I realize that isn't what you said the parents you know expected but my experience has been that is isn't hard to find those who do either (the case I mentioned earlier).

As for the handing food to kids thing, it seems reasonable to me to assume normal parameters apply if a parent puts their child into a normal environment.

[Autumn]

No, my point is that there's 0% chance that the entirety of a class or school is going to be that careful. I'm just pointing out that it's very much the case, therefore, that kids with these kind of allergies are going to feel isolated, because only the few families willing to put in that sort of care are going to be able to spend time with the kid.

It doesn't sound to me like this school in particular was asking much. Rinse out your mouth, wash your hands and wipe off the desks? Maybe my kids would get less sick if all the schools did this. And they're handing out lists of foods, having done the grunt work. I'm sure it seems a hassle for families not close to this kid to have to send in different lunches or snacks. They're not asking anyone to read labels, or change their breakfasts, which are further things which would make the kid even safer. Sounds like a fair compromise.

I know my thoughts are biased, knowing one of these kids, but having to pick a different snack food for your kid is a small sacrifice. I'm just thankful that my kids are healthy and I don't have to spend all day worrying about whether they're going to go into shock.

[Gary Gorski]

I can speak from my friend's experience that yes, it's very hard for her child not to be socially isolated because of his allergies. As i wrote before, a kid touching him that has had peanut butter that morning, hours and hours later, and even after being washed up in between, can send him into a reaction. There are very few parents who she can trust to be careful enough to really keep her kid safe, and that greatly limits his opportunities for interaction. Lots and lots of people just don't take it seriously, and I've watched him breaking out at his birthday party because his own grandparents couldn't be bothered not to eat cream cheese that morning, or because they won't read labels carefully enough to know which bread is safe to eat.

Right but as you wrote you do care enough to take the necessary precautions to be able to go and visit and you do those things because you do care for that one particular child. The parents of this story can't, just as your friend can't, expect everyone to be either so concerned or even remember to keep it as a top priority in their daily lives. Yes, this sort of thing eliminates daily run of the mill interaction in a social setting but as you have shown it does not eliminate the opportunity to have friends - friends that can be visited with the proper precautions and when older there are multiple ways of interacting such as phone, text, online chat/games in addition to visiting and hanging out face to face.

And until you know a kid with a food allergy you don't realize how freely most adults and kids will hand food to someone without asking the parent first.

As I posted above, I do have a child with food allergies so I am very familiar with this. Thankfully they're not life threatening ones but he's six now and has spent the last four years of his life learning that if he does not know the food he has to ask us first about it for this very reason. If someone gives our children say a candy bar he knows enough to smile, say thank you and then when we get to the car or wherever he will just give it to us and we'll allow him to have a candy bar from the house that we have specially for him so that he doesn't feel isolated. He knows that he is not exactly like other kids and his food allergies will isolate him from some social things (like grabbing a pizza with his buddies when he's older) but that's the way it is. It doesn't make it easy on him and he asks now and then why he has the allergies or will he ever be able to eat "regular food" so yeah that's a little tough to deal with but its just how it is and we've taken it upon ourselves through research and cost to find foods that are gluten free and when we go somewhere such as a birthday party we don't expect the host to not order pizza or not to serve cake...we bake him his own pizza and his own cupcakes and bring them with us so that he gets to have pizza and dessert just like everyone else.

We don't expect anyone else to do anything different - if someone offers to do something special to accommodate his situation that's great but we feel that if we want him to be in that situation then we should do what needs to be done to make sure he has food that is safe to eat and if we're unable to do that then we wouldn't allow him to be in that situation or pass the burden on to someone else.

[Lathum]

Hygiene hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis)

Having an 11 month old and being in a parents group with 6 othe parents with kids the same age I can tell you this has legs. It is absurd the over sanitation that goes on with everything. My wife and I are pretty whatever, if our kid drops something on the floor and we are't in someplace overly germ infested we let him put it back in his mouth. It is actually pretty funny to watch some of the other parents cringe. My opinion is the immune system needs practice.

As for gluten allergies, they are very real. My SIL has one, and when she eats gluten she gets realy bad arthritis. My uncle, who is an internal medicine doctor with 40 years experience says the gluten is why, and since she addressed it the problem has gone away.

[Gary Gorski]

No, my point is that there's 0% chance that the entirety of a class or school is going to be that careful. I'm just pointing out that it's very much the case, therefore, that kids with these kind of allergies are going to feel isolated, because only the few families willing to put in that sort of care are going to be able to spend time with the kid.


And I don't want you to think I'm downplaying this side of it - obviously this is very tough for the child and family to deal with but trying to force everyone in the school to change isn't the answer. They won't be able to force a university to not allow peanuts to be used anywhere on campus, they won't be able to force people at a job to not eat peanuts, they won't be able to ensure that nobody in a shopping mall has not eaten something with peanuts that day...their daughter has a very serious allergy and unless the allergy can be cured or lessened somehow she will always have to face these situations.

That's why I said it would be better if the parents spent this effort on figuring out how life can be "normal" for their daughter and teaching her the tools to deal with this for the rest of her life. That's alot for a six year old to take on but like I said, our son has been learning from two how to deal with his food allergies. Her case is far more severe of course as thankfully we don't have to worry about what is in the air of where he is, only about the foods he eats, but the same thing holds true that no matter what they try to force the school to do she's always going to have to deal with this allergy and the potential isolation it creates so why not teach her strategies to do that instead? That's a sad thought for a six year old to not be able to play at a friend's house or go to the playground at school but it's the reality and it also doesn't stop people who really want to be her friend from coming over to her house and playing on a play structure at her own house. She doesn't have to be a "cast-out" like her father said but her allergies do make her different and her parents need to address that and deal with the reality of that situation rather than trying to shoehorn her into what other "normal" kids are doing.

[Autumn]

We don't expect anyone else to do anything different - if someone offers to do something special to accommodate his situation that's great but we feel that if we want him to be in that situation then we should do what needs to be done to make sure he has food that is safe to eat and if we're unable to do that then we wouldn't allow him to be in that situation or pass the burden on to someone else.

Right, but if your child's allergies were much more severe, his options would be much more limited. I'm not saying you or they should expect other parents to do more. I'm saying, of course a kid with this sort of allergy feels isolated or cast out. They are, they can't participate in a great deal of what is normal life for the rest of us and our kids. Your kid can't get the candy bar he's given, but my friend's kid could go into shock if someone handed him unwrapped food. Your kid can't grab some pizza, but my friend's kid can't even go to someone's house, or eat at a restaurant, or get takeout food. I'm not trying to single you out, just using that to emphasize that the order of magnitude is much, much greater than what most kids have to deal with.

Unfortunately people tend to take this as "they're expecting us to do X, Y and Z." And some parents probably come across like that. But I think most parents with these kind of allergies just want others to understand and sympathize, even if they don't do anything different. I've seen the countless times my friend has been told allergies aren't a big deal, or she should stop spoiling her child, etc, etc. If people would just believe and understand that her kids' allergies are dangerous, I think she'd feel much more accepted.

[Pumpy Tudors]

I saw this thread right after stevew started it, and then I just re-read it a moment ago. The thread title didn't really hit me until just now. Love it.

[Autumn]

And I don't want you to think I'm downplaying this side of it - obviously this is very tough for the child and family to deal with but trying to force everyone in the school to change isn't the answer. They won't be able to force a university to not allow peanuts to be used anywhere on campus, they won't be able to force people at a job to not eat peanuts, they won't be able to ensure that nobody in a shopping mall has not eaten something with peanuts that day...their daughter has a very serious allergy and unless the allergy can be cured or lessened somehow she will always have to face these situations.

I agree with you generally with your points here, and am impressed by how well my friend has made this not be a disability in her son's life. He's very aware of how to be careful, knows how to use his EpiPen. She's started a co-op school that my kids are a part of where parents agree to take precautions, etc.

I'm not sure I agree though that it's unreasonable to ask a public school to take these precautions. Aside from the legal arguments, we all have to decide as a society when it's appropriate to exclude a child because their disability is just too much. Is it really such a big deal to wash hands and bring in different snacks? Is that a bigger deal than spending the money to renovate a school to fit wheelchairs?

Yes, universities and jobs aren't going to take the same precautions. (though I think most people outgrow these sort of allergies by adulthood, so that's not as much of an issue). I'm not sure I agree that you're "coddling" the child by giving them this chance to be part of public school before they go off into life. Maybe you're teaching them that they're important enough to stand up and ask your friends and neighbors to help keep him safe. Have we gotten to the point where that's not what we do?

[Gary Gorski]

I'm not sure I agree though that it's unreasonable to ask a public school to take these precautions. Aside from the legal arguments, we all have to decide as a society when it's appropriate to exclude a child because their disability is just too much. Is it really such a big deal to wash hands and bring in different snacks? Is that a bigger deal than spending the money to renovate a school to fit wheelchairs?

Yes, universities and jobs aren't going to take the same precautions. (though I think most people outgrow these sort of allergies by adulthood, so that's not as much of an issue). I'm not sure I agree that you're "coddling" the child by giving them this chance to be part of public school before they go off into life. Maybe you're teaching them that they're important enough to stand up and ask your friends and neighbors to help keep him safe. Have we gotten to the point where that's not what we do?

Its not about the costs involved in doing whatever its about the impact on everyone else and in a hypothetical discussion you can throw out the legal side but we live in an overly litigious society. What happens if a child, not understanding the severity of the issue, grabs a package of peanut butter cookies to bring with him without the parents knowing? Is the school liable? Are the parents of the offending child liable? What if the adult had peanut butter toast for breakfast and gave their child a kiss before sending them to school? You said it yourself that people can't even count on family members to remember what needs to be done all the time - why do you even want to put your child into a dangerous situation where you're relying on people you don't even know to follow a strict set of guidelines every single day when you know its almost guaranteed that at some point someone is going to slip up? What if there's a second child with a gluten allergy that was just as severe? Can you force everyone to put their children on gluten-free foods so that one child can attend a public school? Peanuts aren't that hard to work around for lunches and snacks, you're right, but what if its wheat?

I feel bad for the little girl to have to deal with something like this but her and her parents have to deal with it. They don't have to lock her in the attic but they also have to accept that she's special and she can't live life the way a "normal" six year old would. That said she can still live the life of a six year old, it just takes finding the ways to do it and the people who care about her to allow her to have friends. It sucks for her but that's what life is for her right now.

IMO your friend has the right method here - she has taught her son about his situation and because she can't rely on others to keep him safe she's taken it on herself to start the co-op school that people can choose to be a part of if they're willing to follow the rules. I think that's great and she should be commended for that and I think her child is much safer in that situation and also has been given a great example of if you want or need something done differently then you step up and do it yourself as opposed to pushing that responsibility on everyone else and expecting them to adjust to you.

[Autumn]

But the same argument can be made for all disabilities. okay, we have a child in a wheelchair so we fix all the doorways and bathrooms, railings, etc, etc. Oops, now we have a second child who is blind and needs different things, or has some other disability. The costs there are more indirect, but we clearly pay them as a community. Why should the child who needs no peanuts in the school be treated differently than the child who needs their own aide, or all the stairways to be renovated?

I'm sort of playing devil's advocate here, I don't have a strong opinion about how this should be dealt with, I'm pondering it myself.

[Warhammer]

There is such a thing as tyranny of the minority. The costs of doing some of these precautions are extraordinary. Plus, you start down a slippery slope, if you're willing to do X, going to Y is just a little further, and then Z is...

For example, serving food that is not made with peanuts, ok. Having to wash everytime someone goes outside? What about parents picking up their kids or at a school play, etc. Additionally, you're accepting some liability if something does happen. Little Susie gets sick because someone didn't wash their hands, means someone didn't do their job. Someone needs to pay, etc. Also, let's not forget, we live in a society where we need to post notes in the bathrooms of restaurants that employees need to wash their hands before returning to work.

I think it would be much more effective for the parents to set up their own social network with other children with similar disorders. That way you know the other parents are understanding, etc., etc.

[JediKooter]

The needs of the many, out weigh the needs of the few, or the one...

[Warhammer]

I don't think the issue is so much with peanuts. That can be easily rectified. The problem is with gluten. A gluten free diet is difficult. Plus, when you are running a public enterprise that bids out the food service or food contracts, you're not necessarily going to get the highest grade food.

Heck, I'll use something that affects me, what about certain preservatives? I'm allergic to some preservatives used in cherry pie fillings. These are not listed on the ingredients of the filling. I'm not allergic to anything else on the ingredient list, I can eat some cherry pie fillings with no problems, other times, I get a mild allergic reaction. The laws may have changed, but the preservatives used were not required to be put on the label. I have no idea what preservatives I am sensitive to, or what foods they are in. But the only one I have had issues with is cherry pie filling.

EDIT: How do you police something like that?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Is it really such a big deal to wash hands and bring in different snacks?

From a practical standpoint, I'd say yes, the snack thing is a pain in the ass. Truth is, I give less than a damn whether kid X is at the school or not, and I don't care to be discomfited in the slightest to accommodate them. I don't want them to drop dead (literally), but I resent spending even two extra minutes a week thinking about something in order to deal with someone else's problem. And that's how I see it: not my problem.

Is that a bigger deal than spending the money to renovate a school to fit wheelchairs?

One of the many reasons that I strongly opposed most of the ADA restrictions, as well as the "mainstreaming" efforts that began before it's passage. I believe it too often places an unreasonably high burden - in both cost & practicality - on the majority.

Also, just FTR, I'm not trying to give you any grief either. Just as you were playing devil's advocate, I'm just being brutally honest about how I feel about these situations.

[JonInMiddleGA]

if you want or need something done differently then you step up and do it yourself as opposed to pushing that responsibility on everyone else and expecting them to adjust to you.

If only I had encountered more parents in the situation who felt this way, maybe I wouldn't have such strong feelings about the subject (as expressed above).

I appreciate your approach & would likely be more inclined to make more efforts to be accommodating if I saw it more often.

[Gary Gorski]

But the same argument can be made for all disabilities. okay, we have a child in a wheelchair so we fix all the doorways and bathrooms, railings, etc, etc. Oops, now we have a second child who is blind and needs different things, or has some other disability. The costs there are more indirect, but we clearly pay them as a community. Why should the child who needs no peanuts in the school be treated differently than the child who needs their own aide, or all the stairways to be renovated?

I'm sort of playing devil's advocate here, I don't have a strong opinion about how this should be dealt with, I'm pondering it myself.

The difference is building a wheelchair ramp accommodates that student but doesn't affect anyone else. Nobody has to wash their mouth before entering a classroom and no parent has to read the label of every food item they send in to make sure it doesn't contain the allergen. Something like this puts a burden on everyone else as opposed to just making something more accommodating for one or a handful of students.

Like I said, I feel badly for the child involved - that sucks for her and I don't wish any child to have any sort of disability or disease or serious allergy but there are unfortunately those children and families out there and they just have to find ways to deal with it so that their children can be as healthy and happy as possible.

Everyone else has their own issues to deal with too don't forget. Whether its working multiple jobs, being a single parent, having their own children who have special needs and a host of others - its a lovely thought to think that everyone would love to be accommodating of a situation like this but its not realistic - even the people who are willing to go along with something like this are bound to have an accidental slip up simply because someone else's child is not a top priority in their already far too busy life.

[Autumn]

From a practical standpoint, I'd say yes, the snack thing is a pain in the ass. Truth is, I give less than a damn whether kid X is at the school or not, and I don't care to be discomfited in the slightest to accommodate them. I don't want them to drop dead (literally), but I resent spending even two extra minutes a week thinking about something in order to deal with someone else's problem. And that's how I see it: not my problem.

One of the many reasons that I strongly opposed most of the ADA restrictions, as well as the "mainstreaming" efforts that began before it's passage. I believe it too often places an unreasonably high burden - in both cost & practicality - on the majority.

Also, just FTR, I'm not trying to give you any grief either. Just as you were playing devil's advocate, I'm just being brutally honest about how I feel about these situations.

I appreciate your honesty. I think most of us are like that unless we have an experience that has made us attuned to whatever the particular disability is, or have a relationship with that particular child. I maybe differ in that while I I recognize that most people's reaction is going to be "not my problem," I don't necessarily think we should accept that as the correct reaction.

There definitely is a slippery slope where it's hard to decide which accommodations are reasonable. But there's a slippery slop in the other direction to. At which point do we start accepting that we can not give a crap about the people we live in community with? At what point have we just become calloused, not pragmatic?

I've worked with small schools and organizations and know that ADA requirements can be more than burdensome. I don't have a kneejerk reaction that we have to assume we can or should accommodate anything, the hard reality that most liberals, and in some topics, most Americans, don't want to face is that we can't afford a lot of the things we'd like to do.

However, I think we can allow too much of a backlash too. None of us really want to deal with changing our snack options for someone else's kid. But putting in some effort that may only benefit other people in our community is part of the deal with being part of a civil society. I probably won't need the cops, but I pay for them, I might not use the library but I pay for it, I might not have any kids in school, but I pay for it.

I guess the difference here is that we can all be sure it's not our kid that's going to get hurt. If we just knew there was a chance that one kid out of the class might die from peanuts, we'd make any effort to prevent that. It's kind of odd to me that if it's only one kid who's a victim, it's their responsibility to go elsewhere. I think of all we do to prevent violence or sexual abuse or kidnapping from affecting children, the vast amount of money and time our society spends to keep kids safe. If we knew which kids were going to be the victims of those things, would we save the money and just tell them to stay out of school?

[Autumn]

If only I had encountered more parents in the situation who felt this way, maybe I wouldn't have such strong feelings about the subject (as expressed above).

I appreciate your approach & would likely be more inclined to make more efforts to be accommodating if I saw it more often.

I also agree with this, the reality is that the attitudes of the parents involved have a lot to do with shaping how people react to things like this.

[Autumn]

The difference is building a wheelchair ramp accommodates that student but doesn't affect anyone else. Nobody has to wash their mouth before entering a classroom and no parent has to read the label of every food item they send in to make sure it doesn't contain the allergen. Something like this puts a burden on everyone else as opposed to just making something more accommodating for one or a handful of students.

But that's only an indirect difference. I had to work extra hours to pay the taxes that built that ramp. No matter what the accommodation, people are paying for it, whether it's by rising their mouth or paying taxes or having the money for those accommodations come from other services they could have used.

Certainly, that difference is why you get such a strong reaction to these things - people feel more inconvenienced because there's a very direct thing they now have to do which they didn't before. People resent those sort of things more than they do indirect costs, that's just human nature, but doesn't mean there's a real difference between the two.

[I. J. Reilly]

Other medical experts believe that doctors are over-diagnosing food allergies. They also think that nut bans are an over-reaction to the magnitude of the threat. Dr. Nicholas Christakis, a professor of medical sociology at Harvard Medical School, presents some compelling stats backing up this argument in a 2008 story for the British Medical Journal:

Serious allergic reactions to foods cause just 2,000 hospitalizations a year (out of more than 30 million hospitalizations nationwide). And only 150 people (children and adults) die each year from all food allergies combined. Compare that number with the 50 people who die each year from bee stings, the 100 who die from lightning strikes, and the 45,000 who die in motor vehicle collisions. Or compare it with the 10,000 hospitalizations of children each year for traumatic brain injuries acquired during sports or the 2,000 who drown or the roughly 1300 who die from gun accidents.

Parents want child with peanut allergy removed from school : The Mommy Files (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfmoms/detail?entry_id=85498)


Am I the only one struggling to see the relevance of these numbers? 150 deaths from food allergies is a meaningless number unless you tell me how many people suffer from extreme food allergies. And even then, the vast majority of food allergies are not potentially fatal; they will make you very sick but won’t kill. “Of the x number of people with nut and shellfish allergies 150 die each year” would be relevant, but we don’t know what x is.

And the inclusion of the other data seems like an intentional attempt to lead the reader to view the 150 deaths in the context of the total population. But this was published in a medical journal, so it had to have been peer reviewed, right? So what am I missing?

[Lathum]

Everyone else has their own issues to deal with too don't forget. Whether its working multiple jobs, being a single parent, having their own children who have special needs and a host of others - its a lovely thought to think that everyone would love to be accommodating of a situation like this but its not realistic - even the people who are willing to go along with something like this are bound to have an accidental slip up simply because someone else's child is not a top priority in their already far too busy life.

While true, I think there are better and more diplomatic routes to take than protesting outside the school. That isn't fair to any of the children involved.

[JediKooter]

I love how they compare food allergies with auto accidents or lightning strikes. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, no one is allergic to accidents or lightning.

[Easy Mac]

I love how they compare food allergies with auto accidents or lightning strikes. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, no one is allergic to accidents or lightning.

David Dunn disagrees.

[Gary Gorski]

But that's only an indirect difference. I had to work extra hours to pay the taxes that built that ramp. No matter what the accommodation, people are paying for it, whether it's by rising their mouth or paying taxes or having the money for those accommodations come from other services they could have used.

Certainly, that difference is why you get such a strong reaction to these things - people feel more inconvenienced because there's a very direct thing they now have to do which they didn't before. People resent those sort of things more than they do indirect costs, that's just human nature, but doesn't mean there's a real difference between the two.

There's truth in that for sure but I think there's also the safety/legality issue to deal with and the issue that you are making policy for the benefit of one person. Where do you draw the line at doing that? Is a public school setting precedent in doing this that other public schools will be forced to follow? If not then should parents of allergen students be able to specifically choose that public school to send their children to instead of the one in their district? Seems like its just opening one giant can of worms.

[Gary Gorski]

While true, I think there are better and more diplomatic routes to take than protesting outside the school. That isn't fair to any of the children involved.

I would tend to agree although the school has to know that by making policy for one they're going to rile up everyone else and that people are sometimes more interested in making news than solving problems.

[Suburban Rhythm]

Only skimmed through this, but...

On Jon's point, when we attended a 'Meet the Teacher' when my daughter entered kindergarten this year, there was a mom who started lecturing about what allergies her daughter had (strawberry and lemons) and what our kids should avoid bringing in as snacks or for lunch. I am a reasonable guy, but when you start listing, on the 3rd day of school, the things my child should not be bringing to eat because of your child, I am immediately tuning out. (Also, she had green streaks dyed in her hair...apparently her daughter is not allergic to that).

My daughter's school segregates lunch tables...I would assume this is normal practice. Lucy LOVES peanut butter, takes it virtually every day for lunch. She can't sit with one of her friends who has another allergy (escaping me right now), and therefore sits at the segregated table, which also has kids with peanut allergies.

For Christmas, Valentine's Day etc, we are urged not to send chocolate and candy, rather stickers and pencils. I imagine this is as much related to avoiding foods that may trigger reactions as it is related to the health kick or no candy, sugar, pop, etc that schools are on.

And, related to Lathum's point, aren't there studies regarding the affect of anti-bacterial gels and their OVERuse now? A certain amount of germs are good, for building antibodies to fight those. When you have kids who are bathed in anti-bacterial and decontaminated as soon as they touch dirt, when they are finally exposed to germs, only makes sense their reaction is more severe.

[gstelmack]

And, related to Lathum's point, aren't there studies regarding the affect of anti-bacterial gels and their OVERuse now? A certain amount of germs are good, for building antibodies to fight those. When you have kids who are bathed in anti-bacterial and decontaminated as soon as they touch dirt, when they are finally exposed to germs, only makes sense their reaction is more severe.

There was at least one study that showed that hospitals who switched away from those and back to forcing nurses / doctors to full hand-washing when going from patient to patient cut infection numbers in half. Those things can kill germs, but they can't get the spores and the like, plus they don't actually CLEAN the hands.

[Easy Mac]

My daughter's school segregates lunch tables...I would assume this is normal practice. Lucy LOVES peanut butter, takes it virtually every day for lunch. She can't sit with one of her friends who has another allergy (escaping me right now), and therefore sits at the segregated table, which also has kids with peanut allergies.

Das raciss.

[JediKooter]

David Dunn disagrees.

Ok, this one, I have to admit, went over my head. :(

[Suburban Rhythm]

Das raciss.

I thought this as I typed it...I hoped I'd at least get a 'WELP, I'm done here' out of it

[Lathum]

And, related to Lathum's point, aren't there studies regarding the affect of anti-bacterial gels and their OVERuse now? A certain amount of germs are good, for building antibodies to fight those. When you have kids who are bathed in anti-bacterial and decontaminated as soon as they touch dirt, when they are finally exposed to germs, only makes sense their reaction is more severe.

I can't speak of any studies but I have seen it first hand. My cousin was a germ freak with her kid. Had to use sanatizer before picking the kid up, toy on the floor had to be wipped off, spill on the clothes had to be changed, fell down outside had to wash the kids hands. The kid is now sick ALL THE TIME.

[JediKooter]

I can't speak of any studies but I have seen it first hand. My cousin was a germ freak with her kid. Had to use sanatizer before picking the kid up, toy on the floor had to be wipped off, spill on the clothes had to be changed, fell down outside had to wash the kids hands. The kid is now sick ALL THE TIME.

And unfortunately, they see this as they are not doing enough, instead of easing up on trying to outdo Monk.

[Maple Leafs]

Just a few observations from the parent of a child with a life-threatening peanut allergy:

There's a ridiculous amount of bad information out there about food allergies. I've given up reading the comments on articles on the subject. The number of people who have extremely strong feelings on a subject they know little to nothing about is, to be honest, frightening. If you do want to know about food allergies, please avoid getting your information from anecdotal stories or your personal experiences. They're nice, but those of us who deal with this every day don't have much choice but to take our lead from actual doctors and scientists.

I don't doubt for a second that some parents push the issue too far. I know why they do it -- wouldn't you do anything you could to hhelp keep your child safe? -- but in the long run it's not helpful to anyone. In the (rare) cases where an allergy is so severe that even the slightest exposure is life-threatening, then I'm honestly not sure what the right approach is. There has to be a line somewhere. I don't know where it is.

But if you literally can't be bothered to spend a few minutes a week to help prevent one of your child's classmates from dying in front of them, then I honestly feel sorry for you and for your child.

[molson]

I can't speak of any studies but I have seen it first hand. My cousin was a germ freak with her kid. Had to use sanatizer before picking the kid up, toy on the floor had to be wipped off, spill on the clothes had to be changed, fell down outside had to wash the kids hands. The kid is now sick ALL THE TIME.

I'm hearing more and more parents who have your view on that and its SO refreshing. Germaphobia is a mental illness. People aren't killed from touching doorknobs and eating something that fell on the floor. It's an irrational fear. And it can have disastrous results. I'm glad so many younger parents are realizing this.

[Lathum]

If you do want to know about food allergies, please avoid getting your information from anecdotal stories or your personal experiences. They're nice, but those of us who deal with this every day don't have much choice but to take our lead from actual doctors and scientists.



Not sure if you were talking about my cousin, but I was speaking more about kids getting sick because of over sanitation, not allergies.

And yes, I would do anything to keep my kid safe.

[Maple Leafs]

Not sure if you were talking about my cousin
No, I wasn't referencing anything in the thread in particular.

I'm just amazed at how many people will try to third- or fourth-hand anecdotes in these sorts of discussions. I appreciate that those stories may be interesting or even true, but I'm still going to take the word of my doctor who's studied the issue for 30 years instead.

[Easy Mac]

I remember watching some documentary from the 80's about some kid with peanut allergies, so its not like its some new-hippie made up thing.

Let me see if I can find a clip.

Found it.

<iframe title="YouTube video player" width="480" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VE65VbUBGbI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[jeff061]

For the record I grew up in filth. I think I've taken 2 legit sick days in the last decade. I've always attributed one to the other.

Edit: I understand that's nothing to do with allergies. Was just born lucky on that one.

[Autumn]

But if you literally can't be bothered to spend a few minutes a week to help prevent one of your child's classmates from dying in front of them, then I honestly feel sorry for you and for your child.

I feel this too, though I know when it's presented the wrong way, or if people don't really understand or believe the seriousness, it's easy to not give a rat's ass.

But the fact that we take a lot of extra care to make things safe for our friend is a fantastic lesson for my kids. They learn every week that there are things that are more important than their food preferences, and ways to be flexible and adapt to the situation. I mean there's a lot of backlash against the sort of parents who want us all to adapt to their kids. But I'll take teaching my kid that inconveniencing himself for the good of someone else can be a wonderful, kind, gracious thing.

[stevew]

I can't believe that you guys can send snacks with your kid to school(for the class). We haven't been able to do that for 4-5 years at least.

[Lathum]

No, I wasn't referencing anything in the thread in particular.

I'm just amazed at how many people will try to third- or fourth-hand anecdotes in these sorts of discussions. I appreciate that those stories may be interesting or even true, but I'm still going to take the word of my doctor who's studied the issue for 30 years instead.

OK, cool. I just didn't want you to think I was being insensitive to the topic. My son is actually allergic to eggs. We have to be very clear with our day care provider about him, he has an epi pen, etc...

[JonInMiddleGA]

I can't believe that you guys can send snacks with your kid to school(for the class). We haven't been able to do that for 4-5 years at least.

We've been pretty much required, or at least "strongly urged" to do so until this year when it kind of got played out after a couple of months. That's into gr SEVEN.

I was likewise amazed, but to a person the teachers damned near insisted upon it {shrug}

[JonInMiddleGA]

In the (rare) cases where an allergy is so severe that even the slightest exposure is life-threatening, then I'm honestly not sure what the right approach is. There has to be a line somewhere. I don't know where it is.

That line seems so obvious to me that I'm flabbergasted that your own words didn't highlight it: avoid putting them in those situations. How did you say it wouldn't you do anything you could to help keep your child safe?

Sending them into a mainstream environment while asking that question completely fails to compute for me.

But if you literally can't be bothered to spend a few minutes a week to help prevent one of your child's classmates from dying in front of them, then I honestly feel sorry for you and for your child.

Hey, we agree. I also feel sorry for those of us who are forced to deal with the situation due to the selfishness of the parents who insist on putting their children into apparently dangerous situations, common sense be damned.

[RainMaker]

Having an 11 month old and being in a parents group with 6 othe parents with kids the same age I can tell you this has legs. It is absurd the over sanitation that goes on with everything. My wife and I are pretty whatever, if our kid drops something on the floor and we are't in someplace overly germ infested we let him put it back in his mouth. It is actually pretty funny to watch some of the other parents cringe. My opinion is the immune system needs practice.

Kids are being treated like pussies today. Friend of mine had a baby and they have a bottle of hand sanitizer with them at all times before they even go near the kid. They bought these weird pillows that won't get bacteria and are paranoid about feeding the child anything "processed".

Then we wonder why all these kids have huge problems with basic things later in life. Not saying that's the case with all, but it seems pretty clear that overprotecting kids at an early age causes long term negative effects. As a kid, I was outside all the time, playing in the dirt, building forts in trees, and touching everything I could in public places. Just about every other kid did the same and lived to tell about it. We didn't evolve from a species that had a bottle of Purell in their purse at all times, I'd wish people would realize that more. Our bodies were built to encounter things, fight them off, and grow a resistance to them.

As for the peanut issue and how it relates, studies are showing that giving your kids peanuts early in life will lead to much lower risk of developing a peanut allergy. Big fucking surprise! Yet we have people telling parents not to give their kids peanut butter and peanuts.

Early consumption of peanuts in infancy is associa... [J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2008] - PubMed result (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19000582)

[RainMaker]

I love how they compare food allergies with auto accidents or lightning strikes. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, no one is allergic to accidents or lightning.
And no one is dying from peanut dust or oil residue. The reactions from such things are miniscule and at its absolute worst a local one. Yet we're treating this stuff like it's Anthrax.

I understand there are kids with nut allergies and it sucks, but I think the social hysteria created around it is much worse. Peanuts (and nuts in general) are actually quite healthy for a large percent of the population. They should be a part of a kids diet (especially considering how cheap and calorie dense it can be). And while I understand making sure certain kids don't get peanuts, this hand washing and other extremes is nothing more than pseudo-science bullshit that helps feed the hysteria of these overprotective parents.

The comparision to lighting and accidents is showing that the likelihood of a kid dying from his nut allergy in school is ridiculously miniscule. And that there are much worse things out there that we should be protecting children from.

[Lathum]

Kids are being treated like pussies today. Friend of mine had a baby and they have a bottle of hand sanitizer with them at all times before they even go near the kid. They bought these weird pillows that won't get bacteria and are paranoid about feeding the child anything "processed".

Then we wonder why all these kids have huge problems with basic things later in life. Not saying that's the case with all, but it seems pretty clear that overprotecting kids at an early age causes long term negative effects. As a kid, I was outside all the time, playing in the dirt, building forts in trees, and touching everything I could in public places. Just about every other kid did the same and lived to tell about it. We didn't evolve from a species that had a bottle of Purell in their purse at all times, I'd wish people would realize that more. Our bodies were built to encounter things, fight them off, and grow a resistance to them.

As for the peanut issue and how it relates, studies are showing that giving your kids peanuts early in life will lead to much lower risk of developing a peanut allergy. Big fucking surprise! Yet we have people telling parents not to give their kids peanut butter and peanuts.

Early consumption of peanuts in infancy is associa... [J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2008] - PubMed result (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19000582)

There are a lot of different opinions on introducing peanuts and other foods. I have heard most of them since we have been introducing different foods to our son. The peanut allergey is the big one people worry about. Basicaly there are studies that fall on both sides of the fence and it becomes a personal preferance for the parents and their doctor.

I agree with almos everything else you said except for the processed food part. If we can find something orgamic we prefer to give that to our son over the same food that isn't organic. We arent opposed to giving him processed foods, and aren't obsessive about it, but if there are healthier options then why not. It is an expense we are willing to make

[RainMaker]

This woman was a "real doctor" - she was a MD that practiced for over 40 years and was a graduate of U of M. Its just that her approach was to look for something that may be causing the problem rather than just telling us to put cream X on the sores and see what happens like the third "real doctor" we saw told us to. In fact like I said three "real doctors" had no clue what the problem was and really didn't try very hard to figure it out other than prescribing something. And either she was right or it was a pretty awesome coincidence that after having these sores that would not heal for six months of time that they healed within a week of taking him off gluten.

We don't feel that gluten is horrible for people - the rest of our family still eats gluten (I can't imagine the food bill to feed six of us on what the gluten-free stuff costs). Personally I wonder if some of my random stomach issues are caused by gluten but I like the food I eat too much to try and transition to a gluten free diet :) My son on the other hand started this when he was two so he really doesn't know any different but he's happy, has nearly any food we can think of available to him and most importantly is healthy so we're sticking with the gluten free diet for him.

My bad. When you brought up homeopathic I was thinking more along the lines of those people who open up shops and are basically modern day witch doctors. I have a relative who is older and has been scammed by one for years. Believe she's paid in 20-30k over the last few years for whatever "magic potions" this lady has concocted for her. The "doctor" has told her how she's allergic to all sorts of stuff that apparently was fine for the previous 70 years of her life.

My gluten rant isn't for people who are legitimately allergic to it. It's more toward the people who have turned it into a marketing gimmick. Sort of like "low fat" or "low carb". There are people out there who have no allergies to it who are being suckered into believing that gluten is the cause for minor problems they have. A local pizza place has recently started advertising their Gluten-free dough as a healthy choice on their menu. It should be an option for those with an allergy, but it's not healthier for those who don't have one.

[JediKooter]

And no one is dying from peanut dust or oil residue. The reactions from such things are miniscule and at its absolute worst a local one. Yet we're treating this stuff like it's Anthrax.

I understand there are kids with nut allergies and it sucks, but I think the social hysteria created around it is much worse. Peanuts (and nuts in general) are actually quite healthy for a large percent of the population. They should be a part of a kids diet (especially considering how cheap and calorie dense it can be). And while I understand making sure certain kids don't get peanuts, this hand washing and other extremes is nothing more than pseudo-science bullshit that helps feed the hysteria of these overprotective parents.

The comparision to lighting and accidents is showing that the likelihood of a kid dying from his nut allergy in school is ridiculously miniscule. And that there are much worse things out there that we should be protecting children from.

I don't doubt one bit that this kid has food allergies or that other kids and adults have them. It just bothers me that this family imposes that allergy on an entire school and I wouldn't be surprised if they were quick to sue the school if anything happened to their kid. If I was the school administrator, I'd have the parents sign a liability waiver if they wanted to keep their kid in that school.

Yup, it's the histrionics that get in the way of common sense that seem to get all of the attention. Kind of like the whole, vaccines cause autism thing. My best friend had a daughter a few years ago, the mom refused to take the baby outside for the first 30 days or something like that. As far as I know, she was a healthy baby girl when she was born, so I see no reason why there was this 30 day thing other than paranoia about the kid getting sick.

I just thought the comparison was a very apple to oranges one. The bee stings comparison made more sense, but, I do see what you're saying.

[Maple Leafs]

As for the peanut issue and how it relates, studies are showing that giving your kids peanuts early in life will lead to much lower risk of developing a peanut allergy. Big fucking surprise! Yet we have people telling parents not to give their kids peanut butter and peanuts.

Early consumption of peanuts in infancy is associa... [J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2008] - PubMed result (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19000582)
Some studies say that. Others report the opposite. There's nothing approaching a consensus (although most doctors still seem to prefer waiting).

It's a source of huge confusion and frustration for parents.

[Maple Leafs]

Sending them into a mainstream environment while asking that question completely fails to compute for me.
If by "them" you mean a child who is as senstive as this kid in Florida apparently is, then maybe you're right. But understand that the overwhelming majority of allergic kids don't fall into that category. When you child comes home with a note about not bring peanut products to school, they're almost certainly not referring to a child with that level of sensitivity.

Over 1% of kids are now being diagonosed with peanut allergies, and the number is growing. They should all be pulled out the school system?

Hey, we agree. I also feel sorry for those of us who are forced to deal with the situation due to the selfishness of the parents who insist on putting their children into apparently dangerous situations, common sense be damned.
I let my kids play sports, and presumably you do too. That's an apparently dangerous situation. We don't forfeit the right to expect that there will be some basic protections in place to keep them as safe as realistically possible.

[Maple Leafs]

I understand there are kids with nut allergies and it sucks, but I think the social hysteria created around it is much worse.
Agree 100%, actually.

The comparision to lighting and accidents is showing that the likelihood of a kid dying from his nut allergy in school is ridiculously miniscule.
Also true, in a sense. The actual death rate for peanut allergy kids is extremely low. But, and this is important, it's extremely low because of the precautions schools are taking.

Put it this way: The overwhelming majority of kids who get into car accidents don't die. That's not a reason to stop using seatbelts.

And that there are much worse things out there that we should be protecting children from.
No doubt. But why does it have to be either/or?

[JonInMiddleGA]

If by "them" you mean a child who is as senstive as this kid in Florida apparently is, then maybe you're right.

What I had in mind was something that carried a significant amount of "life threatening".

We don't forfeit the right to expect that there will be some basic protections in place to keep them as safe as realistically possible.

Virtually none of those that I can think of intrude on the routine activities of the other 99%.

[Autumn]

And while I understand making sure certain kids don't get peanuts, this hand washing and other extremes is nothing more than pseudo-science bullshit that helps feed the hysteria of these overprotective parents.

I'm not sure where you're coming from here. Nut allergies very clearly can be spread from second hand contact. As I've said before, I've seen my friend's son go into shock by touching someone who had touched a nut or dairy hours before in a different environment. Washing your hands doesn't seem extreme to me, and I don't see any reason to consider it pseudo-science. It's washing the food off of your skin.

[Autumn]

Virtually none of those that I can think of intrude on the routine activities of the other 99%.

That's simply because we know who is allergic to nuts and who isn't, we don't know which kid is going to get a concussion if they're not wearing a helmet, or kicked in the balls. The fact is you could not wear a helmet in baseball and probably be fine. We ask all the kids to wear batting helmets to help the statistical one kid who might have got hurt if they didn't.

Clearly it's not a perfect analogy, but it seems to me that we're willing to ask everyone to go to great extents to protect a kid from a theoretical danger that probably won't affect them. But we're not willing, I guess, to go to some extent to protect one particular kid from a danger that most likely would affect them.

We do lots of things routinely to keep kids safe, curtailing their freedoms or inconveniencing them or ourselves to avoid danger. Why should we not do it just because we happen to know it's someone else's kid and not ours that would be the victim of the danger?

[Autumn]

The comparision to lighting and accidents is showing that the likelihood of a kid dying from his nut allergy in school is ridiculously miniscule. And that there are much worse things out there that we should be protecting children from.

Those statistics are absolutely meaningless. Yes, a theoretical person has a very statistically low chance of dying of a peanut allergy. They also have a very low chance of *having* a peanut allergy. But once you have one, your chance of dying, or having a severe and dangerous reaction, goes up dramatically.

It's like telling a diabetes patient they shouldn't take meds, because most people don't die of diabetes. Once you're diagnosed, the statistics for the general population don't mean anything any more really.

[Gary Gorski]

My bad. When you brought up homeopathic I was thinking more along the lines of those people who open up shops and are basically modern day witch doctors. I have a relative who is older and has been scammed by one for years. Believe she's paid in 20-30k over the last few years for whatever "magic potions" this lady has concocted for her. The "doctor" has told her how she's allergic to all sorts of stuff that apparently was fine for the previous 70 years of her life.

My gluten rant isn't for people who are legitimately allergic to it. It's more toward the people who have turned it into a marketing gimmick. Sort of like "low fat" or "low carb". There are people out there who have no allergies to it who are being suckered into believing that gluten is the cause for minor problems they have. A local pizza place has recently started advertising their Gluten-free dough as a healthy choice on their menu. It should be an option for those with an allergy, but it's not healthier for those who don't have one.

Yeah she specialized in internal medicine but she just believed in either using natural remedies or exploring what might be causing the problem naturally before suggesting her patients take some kind of pills. We really try not to overmedicate our kids because we believe the same way as some others in this thread - we think its bad to over sanitize them or just continually pump them full of meds because then they're not effective later on. It was refreshing to find a doctor who actually felt the same way rather than the others we saw who just wanted to rush to their next appointment and give us some cream.

As for the gluten thing yeah there are alot of people who are doing it because its the trendy thing now I guess. Personally I like the taste of foods with gluten and my wallet does not like the prices of the gluten free foods so for everyone else in the family we're sticking with gluten :)

[RainMaker]

Also true, in a sense. The actual death rate for peanut allergy kids is extremely low. But, and this is important, it's extremely low because of the precautions schools are taking.
Is it really based on the precautions? I don't remember a huge epidemic of children dying in school from peanut allergies decades ago when there were no precautions. So we've gone from virtually no kids dying from peanut allergies with no precautions to virtually no kids dying from peanut allergies with tons of precautions.

That 150-200 number comes from a study of one county in Minnesota that had one death from a 4 year period. The researcher then used some fuzzy math to estimate the numbers across the country annually. These numbers were also from the 80's when we had no precautions.

It's also worth adding that there is no reported cases of a kid dying from peanut dust in the air, or from touching the hand of someone with some oil on their hands. That the very few documented deaths (so low the CDC doesn't even report it) all involved someone ingesting the actual peanut.

Junk science and paranoid parents make a bad mix. Just look at vaccines.


Put it this way: The overwhelming majority of kids who get into car accidents don't die. That's not a reason to stop using seatbelts.

No doubt. But why does it have to be either/or?
It doesn't have to be either or. But it's worth pointing out that we are putting an awful lot of resources into something that really isn't a problem. We don't have infinite resources at these schools.

And listen, I'm all for protecting the kids. If they have a peanut allergy, we should do our best to make sure they aren't eating a meal with it. We should make sure there are proper medical procedures in place if something happens. But if a kid really can't be in a room unless the whole class is sanitized, he probably shouldn't be going to a public school.

[Gary Gorski]

If by "them" you mean a child who is as senstive as this kid in Florida apparently is, then maybe you're right. But understand that the overwhelming majority of allergic kids don't fall into that category. When you child comes home with a note about not bring peanut products to school, they're almost certainly not referring to a child with that level of sensitivity.

Over 1% of kids are now being diagonosed with peanut allergies, and the number is growing. They should all be pulled out the school system?

I have to agree with Jon - if this girl's situation is that severe I certainly would not be sending her into situations that have the possibility for contamination as large as an entire school.

The thing is though do you draw the lines at certain allergies? I skipped a few responses but has anyone answered the earlier question of what happens if there are children with a gluten allergy? Sure its easy enough to avoid peanuts but how do you avoid gluten? With children seemingly becoming more and more sensitive and sicker as time goes on (due to whatever factors) how do you accommodate everyone or are only certain children important enough to change policies and procedures for?

[RainMaker]

Those statistics are absolutely meaningless. Yes, a theoretical person has a very statistically low chance of dying of a peanut allergy. They also have a very low chance of *having* a peanut allergy. But once you have one, your chance of dying, or having a severe and dangerous reaction, goes up dramatically.

It's like telling a diabetes patient they shouldn't take meds, because most people don't die of diabetes. Once you're diagnosed, the statistics for the general population don't mean anything any more really.
There are over 11 million people with a peanut allergy and none have died from inhaling some dust or touching the hand of someone. So I guess there is a difference. People die from getting struck by lightning, they haven't from inhaling the dust in the air.

The other difference is that we don't remove all sugar products from a school if a kid has diabetes. We don't pat down every child entering the classroom to make sure he hasn't smuggled in some Skittles. There is a proportional approach. We train staff and do our best to make sure the kid doesn't do anything he shouldn't.

[tarcone]

We have a child who has this severe form of peanut allergy coming to our school next year. To the point that we wont be allowed to order Pizza Hut, because they use peanut oil. Im not sure how our school will handle this yet.
We segregate kids who bring peanut butter from the general population, now. But Im not sure how you enforce 500 kids to not bring any peanut type foods or foods made with peanut oils, etc.
We have kids that cant afford to bring more then a cheese sandwich for lunch. Are you going to limit them? What if they dont want to change the way they live or cant or dont know how.

I feel so bad for these kids. What a bad thing to have an allergy. But at what point do we stop helping? What of the kid whose Mom is always out and has to make his/her own lunch and breakfast and the only thing in the house is a jar of peanut butter and a loaf of bread? Sorry, you cant come to school or you have to starve. Is that fair?

Sure thats dramatic, but it is a reality. I dont know the answer. We have adapted for my daughters school. Ice cream sandwiches are peanut free. Thats what we do on their birthdays. But not everyone can or will adapt.

[RainMaker]

I'm not sure where you're coming from here. Nut allergies very clearly can be spread from second hand contact. As I've said before, I've seen my friend's son go into shock by touching someone who had touched a nut or dairy hours before in a different environment. Washing your hands doesn't seem extreme to me, and I don't see any reason to consider it pseudo-science. It's washing the food off of your skin.
Find me deaths caused by peanut dust and hand contact.

[stevew]

Poor kids get free lunches.

[RainMaker]

Yeah she specialized in internal medicine but she just believed in either using natural remedies or exploring what might be causing the problem naturally before suggesting her patients take some kind of pills. We really try not to overmedicate our kids because we believe the same way as some others in this thread - we think its bad to over sanitize them or just continually pump them full of meds because then they're not effective later on. It was refreshing to find a doctor who actually felt the same way rather than the others we saw who just wanted to rush to their next appointment and give us some cream.

As for the gluten thing yeah there are alot of people who are doing it because its the trendy thing now I guess. Personally I like the taste of foods with gluten and my wallet does not like the prices of the gluten free foods so for everyone else in the family we're sticking with gluten :)

Old doctors are the best, especially when it comes to kids. They've seen it all, don't panic, don't overprescribe.

[tarcone]

Poor kids get free lunches.

Not if they dont fill out the paperwork.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

I feel bad for the little girl. I'm sure in her mind the whole uproar isn't about what everybody else has to do, but about her. And why nobody likes her. :( What is going to happen later in life? How will she be able to have a regular job? If you're a boss looking to hire someone and you have two qualified candidates, but one has this long list of things that you need to change in your workplace in order for her to work there... Guess who gets the job.

As for the whole severe allergy thing being a new matter, it's my uneducated guess that severe allergies to everyday things have been around for thousands of years. We just weren't as aware of what they were and missed the people that died for whatever unknown reason.

[tarcone]

I feel bad for the little girl. I'm sure in her mind the whole uproar isn't about what everybody else has to do, but about her. And why nobody likes her. :( What is going to happen later in life? How will she be able to have a regular job? If you're a boss looking to hire someone and you have two qualified candidates, but one has this long list of things that you need to change in your workplace in order for her to work there... Guess who gets the job.

As for the whole severe allergy thing being a new matter, it's my uneducated guess that severe allergies to everyday things have been around for thousands of years. We just weren't as aware of what they were and missed the people that died for whatever unknown reason.

Or is it Pharmas telling doctors that they have a new drug to sell. And they want the docs to label people a certain way?

Coincidence or conspiracy?

[Uncle Briggs]

This whole thread makes me sad.

I resent spending even two extra minutes a week thinking about something in order to deal with someone else's problem. And that's how I see it: not my problem.

Have you considered that if you devoted the time you spent reading this and posting about why you shouldn't have to do it to actually flipping over a few boxes and looking at the allergen warnings you would have had more than enough time to select nut-free snacks for the rest of the school year? Plus, your blood pressure would be lower.

And I don't mean to single out John. Come on people, do you not ever do something you find inconvenient or stupid just to benefit another person or make them happy? Out of all the screwed up things that you have to deal with in life every day, this is where you draw the line?

It's a small act of sacrifice to help another person out. Whoever said that earlier had exactly the right idea. Even the example in the intial post; does it take that much out of us to wash hands and gargle so a child can actually have a semi-normal life?

Alright, rant over. I've violated my arguing on the internet policy. But, just dang, people.

[lighthousekeeper]

We can all agree that due to human nature, there are inevitably going to be a few parents, kids, teachers or aides who will either intentionally or through unintentional oversight ignore the warnings that they are given regarding peanut allergy prevention. This is a sad but unavoidable truth.
Knowing this fact to be true, any parent whose child has peanut allergies so severe that he or she may die, who still insists in exposing their child to a public school setting (and the inherent life-threatening danger it certainly poses as agreed on in point #1) should be charged with negligence for endangering the welfare of a child. Perhaps to the point of removing the child from parental custody.


(I think this is the gist of Jon's argument - if not, I'll claim it.)

[Schmidty]

I feel bad for the little girl. I'm sure in her mind the whole uproar isn't about what everybody else has to do, but about her. And why nobody likes her. :(

Yeah, that's pretty much my biggest reaction to this thread.

Other than that, I think people just like to have things to be outraged by.

[stevew]

It would be hilarious irony if the girl in question was named Reese.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Have you considered that if you devoted the time you spent reading this and posting about why you shouldn't have to do it to actually flipping over a few boxes and looking at the allergen warnings you would have had more than enough time to select nut-free snacks for the rest of the school year?

Have you considered that available time is not an on-demand item? That the time I had today (or other days) to spend here is not transferable to getting a kid out the door with a snack in hand? Or simply how fucking annoying I find it to be forced to give serious consideration to every label on everything I might send my kid to school with? Surely we'd both agree that doing a half-assed job isn't sufficient, you miss a day & send the wrong thing & all previous efforts are for naught. It becomes a full-time "have-to" to be successful & tbh I've got more than my own share of "have-to" items on the list already, I'm simply not the least bit interested in adopting someone else's have-to.

It's a small act of sacrifice to help another person out. Whoever said that earlier had exactly the right idea. Even the example in the intial post; does it take that much out of us to wash hands and gargle so a child can actually have a semi-normal life?

And gargling before re-entering a room is part of "a normal life" for the vast majority of people? For that matter, adopting the persistent stress of worrying about extreme instances like the one in this case is part of "a normal life"? For someone you aren't closely connected to? That sounds closer to a mental/emotional condition that needs treatment than it does to "normal life".

[JonInMiddleGA]

It would be hilarious irony if the girl in question was named Reese.

Not as good as if her name were Skippy.

[Uncle Briggs]

And gargling before re-entering a room is part of "a normal life" for the vast majority of people? For that matter, adopting the persistent stress of worrying about extreme instances like the one in this case is part of "a normal life"? For someone you aren't closely connected to? That sounds closer to a mental/emotional condition that needs treatment than it does to "normal life".

It's not as if they wanted a pint of blood every time. I understand you in principle, but I believe we disagree slightly on the scale of the problem. And, even were I to agree with you 100%, that's what a sacrifice is. Love your neighbor as yourself. Do unto others. If you won't do it for others, do it as a gift for God.

But anyways. This is one of those things where if we knew each other in real life, we would have to just each agree that we think the other is wrong (or has a mental/emotional condition that needs treatment) and not bring it up anymore. I give you the last word on the subject (if you care) and I shall speak of it no more.

[JonInMiddleGA]

But anyways. This is one of those things where if we knew each other in real life, we would have to just each agree that we think the other is wrong (or has a mental/emotional condition that needs treatment) and not bring it up anymore. I give you the last word on the subject (if you care) and I shall speak of it no more.

Nah, I'm good. (unless ya wanna count that as "last word")

[Blackadar]

Shit...I actually have to agree somewhat with JIMG. I feel so...dirty.

My kid is allergic to cat dander. Sorry, you're going to have to put little Fluffy to sleep so my kid doesn't sneeze. If a kid has no immune system, should we make everyone else walk around in bubbles to prevent the spread of germs?

I really don't mean to belittle the kid because she can't help it. But I sure mean to belittle the parents who are putting her in danger. It's one thing to ask for consideration, it's entirely another to severely inconvenience everyone and this crosses that line for me. My wife cooks with peanut oil because it's one of the "healthier" oils and burns well at very high heat (which necessary for cooking Oriental food). My son loves peanut butter. Now he can't have home-cooked food because little Missy is THAT allergic to peanuts? To hell with that.

I have no patience for that kind of bullshit. I'd tell the school that I'm sending peanut butter sandwiches every frickin' day for lunch (and God pity them if they try to make my kids go hungry) and washing my kid in every peanut-based soap/shampoo I can find on the market. I'd force the issue so that they have to find a better solution than severely inconveniencing everyone. And yeah, I think not being able to eat home-cooked food, gargling after every meal, being exposed to caustic cleaning chemicals (my daughter breaks out in rashes from Clorox), getting less of an education and denying snacks to 6 year olds every single frickin day is getting into the severely inconvenienced territory.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

I kinda agree with Jon also... I don't think anybody wants to be an unfeeling bastard, but when does it end? Do we all need to wear hazmat suits and disinfect everything in society so the boy in the bubble can walk around and feel "normal?" (And sue if someone on the third floor of a building down the block didn't get the memo, deciding to enjoy some delicious Emeralds nuts to stave off Robert Goulet.)

[Autumn]

Unfortunately all this says to me is how far we've come from real communities, where we felt a real connection to the other people in our town and school. I'm not saying it's a good idea to send this kid to school. But the reactions people have to needing to go out of their way for someone else, I can't imagine they'd have these reactions if it was for someone they know and care about. Community is all about inconvenience - spending your time making meals for someone who just had a baby, or changing your clothes when you visit your friend with a cat allergy, taking the time to shovel your sidewalk that other people use, stopping what you're doing to help someone whose car just broke down. It's all inconvenient.

I think the difference is we now have this layer between us and everyone else. It's not talking with your child's classmate's parent, and finding out they need you to send in a different snack. It's hearing at a school meeting the principal tell you to bring in different snacks because Mr. Whatchamacallit wants you to. We've gotten big enough and divorced enough from each other that we don't really interact in a real way any more. And nobody likes to be told what to do by some authority figure or some annoying person we don't know. I'd like to think if it wasn't so we wouldn't quite so upset that's someone asking us to go out of our way to help them.

[Autumn]

I have no patience for that kind of bullshit. I'd tell the school that I'm sending peanut butter sandwiches every frickin' day for lunch (and God pity them if they try to make my kids go hungry) and washing my kid in every peanut-based soap/shampoo I can find on the market. I'd force the issue so that they have to find a better solution than severely inconveniencing everyone. And yeah, I think not being able to eat home-cooked food, gargling after every meal, being exposed to caustic cleaning chemicals (my daughter breaks out in rashes from Clorox), getting less of an education and denying snacks to 6 year olds every single frickin day is getting into the severely inconvenienced territory.

Three points. One, you just rinse your mouth once when you get to school. Two, don't all public schools provide food for the kids? And don't most of them not allow outside food anymore? So this is simply something for the school to research and make the right decisions on. Three, what if they used Clorox wipes to clean the school for germs. Should they stop because your kid is allergic to them? Should the rest of the kids be in more danger from germs because of your kid, or should you keep your kid home? Where does it stop indeed.

[Autumn]

I kinda agree with Jon also... I don't think anybody wants to be an unfeeling bastard, but when does it end? Do we all need to wear hazmat suits and disinfect everything in society so the boy in the bubble can walk around and feel "normal?" (And sue if someone on the third floor of a building down the block didn't get the memo, deciding to enjoy some delicious Emeralds nuts to stave off Robert Goulet.)

Maybe it ends before we let kids with peanut allergies in, or maybe it ends somewhere after there. But the slippery slope argument doesn't really tell us anything other than that there should be a line somewhere. There's about a thousand examples upslope of ways kids inconvenience the rest of us somehow, but we don't stop doing all those things just because a slippery slope exists.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

Maybe a school should be established somewhere that is for students with severe peanut allergies. Then, instead of hundreds of parents worrying that their child may have stepped through a waft of nut dust on the way to school, the parents of a child with this condition would have a place to go. They may be inconvenienced a bit in having to move somewhere they don't necessarily want to, but I think that's what it comes down to... who gets inconvenienced, one family that actually has an issue to deal with, or everybody else?

[wade moore]

Two, don't all public schools provide food for the kids? And don't most of them not allow outside food anymore?

I've never-ever heard of this. I know for sure that this isn't the case in at least 3 school divisions around here.

Completely foreign concept to me, but maybe I'm missing the boat. I'm very pro-public school, but a rule like this honestly would potentially force my kids (if I had any) into private school.

[wade moore]

Unfortunately all this says to me is how far we've come from real communities, where we felt a real connection to the other people in our town and school. I'm not saying it's a good idea to send this kid to school. But the reactions people have to needing to go out of their way for someone else, I can't imagine they'd have these reactions if it was for someone they know and care about. Community is all about inconvenience - spending your time making meals for someone who just had a baby, or changing your clothes when you visit your friend with a cat allergy, taking the time to shovel your sidewalk that other people use, stopping what you're doing to help someone whose car just broke down. It's all inconvenient.

I think the difference is we now have this layer between us and everyone else. It's not talking with your child's classmate's parent, and finding out they need you to send in a different snack. It's hearing at a school meeting the principal tell you to bring in different snacks because Mr. Whatchamacallit wants you to. We've gotten big enough and divorced enough from each other that we don't really interact in a real way any more. And nobody likes to be told what to do by some authority figure or some annoying person we don't know. I'd like to think if it wasn't so we wouldn't quite so upset that's someone asking us to go out of our way to help them.


I think you're being a bit extreme here. Yes, Jon is going a bit nuts. But, I think the idea is that there has to be a line somewhere. This school seems to be over or approaching that line.

[JonInMiddleGA]

And don't most of them not allow outside food anymore?

By "outside food", do you mean like fast food takeout? Or lunches from home?

Most of the ones I'm familiar with (both public & private) wouldn't dream of touching lunches from home & have few/no restrictions on what constitutes "from home". For example, my son takes a spare doublecheeseburger from McD or BK once in a while (they reheat great) or leftover pizza from wherever or leftover pasta from a local Italian place. Policy on having takeout delivered fresh by the parents (or even by delivery) has varied from school to school, from wide open to not at all.

[Passacaglia]

I remember watching some documentary from the 80's about some kid with peanut allergies, so its not like its some new-hippie made up thing.

Let me see if I can find a clip.

Found it.

<iframe title="YouTube video player" width="480" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VE65VbUBGbI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Did you just call Freaks and Geeks "some documentary from the 80's"?

[Autumn]

By "outside food", do you mean like fast food takeout? Or lunches from home?

Most of the ones I'm familiar with (both public & private) wouldn't dream of touching lunches from home & have few/no restrictions on what constitutes "from home". For example, my son takes a spare doublecheeseburger from McD or BK once in a while (they reheat great) or leftover pizza from wherever or leftover pasta from a local Italian place. Policy on having takeout delivered fresh by the parents (or even by delivery) has varied from school to school, from wide open to not at all.

Hmm, yeah I meant from home. I thought I'd seen, for instance, a number of posters on FOFC say it had been a long time since their kids were allowed to bring food in to school.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Unfortunately all this says to me is how far we've come from real communities, where we felt a real connection to the other people in our town and school.

A by-product of the transient nature of American society. As far back as the 60's, up to 20% of the population relocates in a given year. Even as the trend slows a bit during the recession, it's still 1 in 7.

But the reactions people have to needing to go out of their way for someone else, I can't imagine they'd have these reactions if it was for someone they know and care about.

But that's a big part of the issue I think: these aren't people the majority of any school/community know or care about.

I think the difference is we now have this layer between us and everyone else.

At the risk of taking this into an amateur sociology sidebar, I believe you're overestimating the impact of this. On the whole, I think I've liked the various principals/headmasters I've dealt with at least equally well as random parent X, and in at least 2 of 3 schools my son has attended it's very easy to say I've liked the average administrator considerably more than I like the average parent (possibly due to their ability to charm/politic their way into those positions in the first place but that's neither here nor there I guess).

More than that though, I think you're underestimating the change in sheer size we've undergone in the U.S. in a fairly short period of time. We've grown by 9% in the past decade, by 50% since 1970, and more than doubled since 1950 (a reasonable benchmark for the more idyllic community-oriented environment you're talking about). Not only have we grown, we've become steadily more diverse ... which by it's very nature removes more of that sense of community you're talking about.

So we move around a lot, there's a gigantic truckload more of us, and we have less in common than ever before. Those things all seem likely to have more impact on the reaction than who is making the request.

[Autumn]

I think you're being a bit extreme here. Yes, Jon is going a bit nuts. But, I think the idea is that there has to be a line somewhere. This school seems to be over or approaching that line.

First of all, I don't think Jon's going nuts. His answers, in particular, have been raw but honest. There were a number of people in thread who seemed rather upset by the idea of having to go this far. I also know through my friend that she constantly gets really angry and sometimes heartless responses from people about her son's allergies. Someone was just saying in here they'd wash their kid in peanut soap to force the issue. These things just seem to indicate a level of outrage that I don't think needs to be there.

And my response was stepping away from this issue and talking on a more global level about the way our society works these days. Once upon a time you'd deal with people face to face over this, and I daresay most people would respond differently. They'd say, "This would be a real problem for me, not being able to send in homecooked food cooked in peanut oil." And the other person would say, "Oh, I see that. I'm really worried about how to keep my son safe though." And they'd maybe come up with a solution that worked for both of them. The difference between that and what we actually do these days is striking.

[Autumn]

At the risk of taking this into an amateur sociology sidebar, I believe you're overestimating the impact of this. On the whole, I think I've liked the various principals/headmasters I've dealt with at least equally well as random parent X, and in at least 2 of 3 schools my son has attended it's very easy to say I've liked the average administrator considerably more than I like the average parent (possibly due to their ability to charm/politic their way into those positions in the first place but that's neither here nor there I guess).

More than that though, I think you're underestimating the change in sheer size we've undergone in the U.S. in a fairly short period of time. We've grown by 9% in the past decade, by 50% since 1970, and more than doubled since 1950 (a reasonable benchmark for the more idyllic community-oriented environment you're talking about). Not only have we grown, we've become steadily more diverse ... which by it's very nature removes more of that sense of community you're talking about.

So we move around a lot, there's a gigantic truckload more of us, and we have less in common than ever before. Those things all seem likely to have more impact on the reaction than who is making the request.

No, you're pointing out exactly what I meant, I just didn't have the energy and brains to put it so well today. Those are the exact things I mean, I just think that metaphorically there's a layer there, people think of the school and the government and the town as things separate from them. Even in small groups this is common sociology. I lived in a relatively small communal group, and people treated things the "community" owned or did very differently than things that were privately owned or done, even though they were clearly a part of that community. Because of all the factors you list up there, that's how we treat nearly everything these days. Thank you for describing it so well.

[JonInMiddleGA]

I thought I'd seen, for instance, a number of posters on FOFC say it had been a long time since their kids were allowed to bring food in to school.

If so, I've missed those entirely. Over 2/3rds of my son's (private) school brings their lunches. By her estimate, roughly 20% of my niece's very public HS brought theirs (random anecdote courtesy of an unrelated discussion last year about the quality/lack thereof of school food).

As wademoore said, anything like that around here would cause one hell of a fight (due to both the intrusive nature of such a move as well as the financial burden it would place on some families).

[wade moore]

If so, I've missed those entirely. Over 2/3rds of my son's (private) school brings their lunches. By her estimate, roughly 20% of my niece's very public HS brought theirs (random anecdote courtesy of an unrelated discussion last year about the quality/lack thereof of school food).

As wademoore said, anything like that around here would cause one hell of a fight (due to both the intrusive nature of such a move as well as the financial burden it would place on some families).

And Jon hit the nail on the head. If you're going to tell me my hypothetical kid can't bring food from home, you'd better make some DRAMATIC changes to the school food options.

I don't see that happening.

[JonInMiddleGA]

First of all, I don't think Jon's going nuts. His answers, in particular, have been raw but honest.

I appreciate that, since that was my intent. Yeah, the blunt parts were very much intentional (actually toned down a lot of my first phrasing choices) but that seemed to be the most productive route to take for any decent discussion on this. Tap dancing certainly didn't seem particularly useful nor interesting to me.

Someone was just saying in here they'd wash their kid in peanut soap to force the issue. These things just seem to indicate a level of outrage that I don't think needs to be there.

Eh, with what's described in the initial article, I'd say forcing the issue is well past due. The peanut soap bath isn't the route I'd go personally, but I'd definitely be looking for ways to make life as miserable as possible for the parent(s) of this particular kid with everything from social ostracization to boycotting their employer/business, pretty much whatever it takes to break their will to fight this. Failing that, to ensure they pay an extremely heavy price for their choice. Hell, I was annoyed just reading the story from a distance, I'd probably be a prime target for a bail bond company if this was something I was actually dealing with up close.

Once upon a time you'd deal with people face to face over this, and I daresay most people would respond differently. They'd say, "This would be a real problem for me, not being able to send in homecooked food cooked in peanut oil." And the other person would say, "Oh, I see that. I'm really worried about how to keep my son safe though." And they'd maybe come up with a solution that worked for both of them. The difference between that and what we actually do these days is striking.

My argument would be that f2f would be more likely to produce a heated suggestion that someone, umm, do something virtually anatomically impossible. If anything, having the layer in between has probably kept this more civil than it otherwise would have been. Goes right back to what you were talking about, take two average people at random & neither particularly cares whether the other lives, dies, fucks, or flies.

[Autumn]

My argument would be that f2f would be more likely to produce a heated suggestion that someone, umm, do something virtually anatomically impossible. If anything, having the layer in between has probably kept this more civil than it otherwise would have been. Goes right back to what you were talking about, take two average people at random & neither particularly cares whether the other lives, dies, fucks, or flies.

If you pull them out of their lives as they are right now, sure. But I'm saying in a different context, when you remove the distance between people, I think they're more likely to deal with each other in a reasonable way. When some fuckwad shows up at school and starts telling you to change your snacks, you're going to get your dander up. When someone you slightly know sits down with you and explains the problems their kid is facing, you're more likely to look for solutions. That's my experience with people at least.

[Gary Gorski]

Unfortunately all this says to me is how far we've come from real communities, where we felt a real connection to the other people in our town and school. I'm not saying it's a good idea to send this kid to school. But the reactions people have to needing to go out of their way for someone else, I can't imagine they'd have these reactions if it was for someone they know and care about. Community is all about inconvenience - spending your time making meals for someone who just had a baby, or changing your clothes when you visit your friend with a cat allergy, taking the time to shovel your sidewalk that other people use, stopping what you're doing to help someone whose car just broke down. It's all inconvenient.

You're right - people are willing to go out of their way for someone they care about just as you are for your friend - but you're wrong in saying that people don't go out of their way for someone they don't care about. How many people will rifle through their purse to come up with a couple of bucks for the Salavation Army guy or the Veteran collecting on the streets? How many people donate their time and money to soup kitchens and shelters and how many people donate money for relief efforts all over the world as well as in their own communities? We had a text sim developer who passed away suddenly leaving his wife and kids behind and I took my college basketball game and cut the price in half and came here as well as to other places and asked people to buy the game even if they didn't want the game just so we could collect money to send to his family and people bought it. This community especially is well known for helping people who are going through tough times or tragedies.

The difference is that people are willing to step up and help and in some cases give the shirt off their back when its their choice to do so. It's also not a forced change in their daily rituals - its a one time or a couple of times things just like the examples you pointed out here. There's plenty of people in the world who don't give a shit about anyone but themselves but there's still alot of good people out there and many of the people on this forum fall into that category it seems. But even the good people don't live in Mayberry - they don't come home to June Cleaver. They get up, bust their ass at work, come home and deal with bills, kids, life, try to squeeze out a few minutes of enjoyment out of some form of entertainment and go to bed to do it all again the next day. Some don't even have the luxury of getting a break - they come home from job one and go to job two. People are busier than ever because things are more expensive and it costs more to live and they're worried about how to pay the gas bill next month - you can't blame them that some girl's peanut allergy is not at the top of their list of everyday concerns.

I also think you can use the community argument the other way too. Shouldn't the parents be mindful of the fact that they're forcing everyone in the community to take this on and simply homeschool her so as not to put that burden on everyone else? Honestly if her allergy is that sever she should not be in school and if its not I bet they would get a ton more support if they and the school simply setup peanut-free tables or whatnot and just explained to parents that there is a girl in the school with a severe allergy so please try and be mindful of the snacks they send in or whatever.

[JonInMiddleGA]

When someone you slightly know sits down with you and explains the problems their kid is facing, you're more likely to look for solutions. That's my experience with people at least.

We're probably down to one of those fundamental differences in how we view people (which is fine). More often than not, the better I know someone the more I'm reminded of a great line from songwriter Lucinda Williams "The more I see of these cowboys, the more I think of their horse".

[Autumn]

I also think you can use the community argument the other way too. Shouldn't the parents be mindful of the fact that they're forcing everyone in the community to take this on and simply homeschool her so as not to put that burden on everyone else? Honestly if her allergy is that sever she should not be in school and if its not I bet they would get a ton more support if they and the school simply setup peanut-free tables or whatnot and just explained to parents that there is a girl in the school with a severe allergy so please try and be mindful of the snacks they send in or whatever.

Sure, that's what I'm suggesting, that if there was a real conversation between that parent and the other parents, both would have to work on a solution. Maybe the parents would decide to keep their kids home. Maybe the group would work out a different solution. The result would grow from them, and it certainly would require work and compromise from both sides.

There's something that makes us not expect that though, give and take. We assume the parent of the kid with an allergy is going to make irresponsible demands on the rest of us, and we assume the parents in the school are going to be outraged at having to be inconvenienced. I suppose it's a parallel to the sort of reactionary polarity we see in politics too. There's reasons for it - we've already heard a lot of examples of parents being an ass about their kids allergies, we know that happens. And we've seen the other side as well. We don't hold much space open for the idea that people could be reasonable though, and take our needs into account as well as their own. Probably because it doesn't happen often. . The trouble is, once you stop expecting it, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

[Autumn]

We're probably down to one of those fundamental differences in how we view people (which is fine). More often than not, the better I know someone the more I'm reminded of a great line from songwriter Lucinda Williams "The more I see of these cowboys, the more I think of their horse".

Well, there's that too, definitely. I guess the difference is then maybe we can say, "I'm not changing my snack's for Frank's kid. Frank's an asshole." Versus "I'm not changing my snacks for that guy's kid. That guy's probably an asshole." ;-)

[JediKooter]

I think the idea of 'if we lived in communities, the world would be a better place', is kind of not true. What happens when you start having a more communal environment, then you start getting into the various cliques, just like high school. Whether it be because one group doesn't share the same religion, race, background, etc...

Yes, it's nice to think that a community would rally around to help someone in need, but, the reality of the world is, unless they are in your 'group' or their ideals and beliefs are close to yours, the odds of that happening are rather diminished in my opinion.

[albionmoonlight]

My grandparents' generation: Fought WWII. Didn't complain.

My generation: Walks around with protest signs because someone made their precious princess wash her hands at school to save another kid's life.

Fuck my generation.

[Ben E Lou]

Either three or four weeks ago today (not 100% sure which), I got a call on my cell phone from my daughter's school saying that she was running a fever and had had diarrhea three times in the last 25 minutes. I was out eating lunch at the time. I had phone appointments with three different clients scheduled that afternoon, one of which was critical, need-to-happen-today stuff, and my wife was out of town for a quick work overnight--left Thursday morning, returning Friday evening.

So in the next 25 minutes it took to get from the restaurant to the school, I am trying to call...
our pediatrician to see if I can bring her in quickly
my wife to let her know what's going on
my father-in-law (pediatrician) to see if he thinks I *need* to take her in or should just take her home and let her sleep
my boss to let him know I'm out for the day
our work's resource management team to see if they can schedule someone else for the need-to-happen-today client
my other two clients to push those appointments back to the following Monday.As I said, I was at lunch. It happens that I was eating a steak at the nearby grill on that day. But what if I'd been eating at my favorite Thai place??? And what if I had ordered my favorite appetizer and meal at that place??? That would be chicken satay appetizer (peanut-based dip) and jumbo shrimp masaman curry entree (also has quite a bit of peanut in it.)

Look at those six bullet points above. Are you going to stake your child's very LIFE on the hope that a stranger is even going to remember in the midst of all that chaos "oh, I just ate peanuts...better do something." And if said stranger's brain does even click, are you going to stake your child's very LIFE on the hope that a stranger is going to remember in the midst of all that chaos to...what, exactly? Stop off at Wal-Mart and buy sweatpants and a t-shirt before he goes into the school? (Surely in that Thai dive my clothes have peanut oil all in them, and I may have spilled some curry sauce or the appetizer dip on my clothes.)

There is a child at my daughter's school with peanut allergies strong enough that it has been requested that we not send peanut butter, peanuts, etc. in lunches. It's not life-threatening, and that's the end of the "inconvenience" for everyone. I think that's reasonable.

But if my kid had a life-threatening peanut allergy, there's simply no way that I'm staking her life on a near-stranger remembering to stop and consider her in the midst of their chaos. I'm all about community and knowing neighbors and all of that. My wife and I are main catalysts of frequent neighborhood gatherings, oftentimes hosted in our home. But I'm also realistic. A thousand different variations of the scenario I mention above could occur, and I'm not risking my kid's life on any of them.

So, yeah. Put me in the camp of "it's grossly negligent to put your child in the situation to rely on the ability of hundreds of other people to follow instructions to protect her."

Yes, it sucks for the kid. Yes, it sucks for the parent. I feel terribly for them. But put me in their shoes, and I'm not relying on the thought recall of the dumb masses out there to keep my kid alive. Period.

[JonInMiddleGA]

My grandparents' generation: Fought WWII. Didn't complain.

That same generation would have laughed their asses off at a story as absurd as this & told the parents & the administrators to go to hell while cracking roasted peanuts & dropping the shells at their feet.

[Maple Leafs]

But if my kid had a life-threatening peanut allergy, there's simply no way that I'm staking her life on a near-stranger remembering to stop and consider her in the midst of their chaos.... So, yeah. Put me in the camp of "it's grossly negligent to put your child in the situation to rely on the ability of hundreds of other people to follow instructions to protect her."
Every peanut allergy is a life-threatening one. That's what makes them so difficult to manage.

So you're saying that, if your child was one of the hundreds of thousands with this relatively common condition, you would... what, exactly? Never let them out of the house? And you're framing this as some sort of appeal to practicality?

Yes, it sucks for the kid. Yes, it sucks for the parent. I feel terribly for them. But put me in their shoes, and I'm not relying on the thought recall of the dumb masses out there to keep my kid alive. Period.
You rely on the "dumb masses" to keep your kid alive every day. You rely on them to not drive through red lights, or fall asleep during their shift as a lifeguard, or remember that they're not supposed to let the kids drink from the beaker in chemistry class. You "stake your child's very LIFE" on other people all the time. Nobody tells you to keep your kid at sealed up at home until you can figure out a way to reduce the risk to absolute zero.

Parents of kids with allergies can't win. If we ask for some basic help from the community, we're over-protecting our kids and living in fear. If we try to make reasonable compromises, we're negligent parents endangering our children.

(And as far as the specific scenario you outlined, it's really not difficult. You go to the school and get your sick child. You're making this out to be some sort of terrible dilemma. It's not. Go get your kid.)

[Glengoyne]

If the thought is that most if not all of these children with severe allergies will eventually grow out of them, is it believed that they develop immunities or a tolerance for their respective allergens? What is the mechanism for the improvement?

On another note: earlier in the there was someone asking if there were documented cases of a death due to peanut allergy passed by touch. Didn't a high school student die after kissing her boyfriend who had eaten a peanut butter cracker or some such?

[sterlingice]

On another note: earlier in the there was someone asking if there were documented cases of a death due to peanut allergy passed by touch. Didn't a high school student die after kissing her boyfriend who had eaten a peanut butter cracker or some such?

Isn't that a little more than a touch? That's pretty much ingesting if you're swapping saliva, right?

SI

[JPhillips]

If the thought is that most if not all of these children with severe allergies will eventually grow out of them, is it believed that they develop immunities or a tolerance for their respective allergens? What is the mechanism for the improvement?

On another note: earlier in the there was someone asking if there were documented cases of a death due to peanut allergy passed by touch. Didn't a high school student die after kissing her boyfriend who had eaten a peanut butter cracker or some such?

Asthma.

A Canadian coroner confirmed Thursday that a teenager — once believed to have died from a peanut allergy after kissing her boyfriend — died from an asthma attack.

Coroner Michael Miron said Christina Desforges, 15, died from cerebral anoxia, or lack of oxygen to the brain, triggered by a severe asthma attack.

In a preliminary report in March, Miron rejected a peanut allergy as the cause of death, saying he suspected cerebral anoxia. But he provided no further details.

The 15-year-old girl stopped breathing on Nov. 20 after kissing her boyfriend, who had eaten a peanut butter snack. Official findings at the time linked the death to a peanut allergy, drawing widespread media attention.

But Miron said the initial report that lingering peanut allergens from that kiss triggered an allergic reaction was wrong.

"Nine hours passed between the time when the young man ate his two toasts (with peanut butter) and 3 a.m., when he kissed Christina," Miron said. "A recent study shows at the end of an hour, there is no allergen left in the saliva."

He said she had spent hours at a party with smokers when her breathing problems began. Around 3 a.m., Desforges said she was having trouble breathing and collapsed shortly after.

She was taken to the hospital, but the coroner estimates her brain was deprived of oxygen for 25 to 30 minutes. She was taken off life support nine days later.

Miron explained that in March [he] broke the usual silence preceding the full release of a coroner's report to clarify the erroneous reports about the allergy. He said the reports were triggering suspicions that injections used to treat allergic reactions were ineffective.

[Maple Leafs]

If the thought is that most if not all of these children with severe allergies will eventually grow out of them, is it believed that they develop immunities or a tolerance for their respective allergens? What is the mechanism for the improvement?
Actually, the "outgrow" rate for peanut allergies is only about 20%. (It's higher for other foods.)

On another note: earlier in the there was someone asking if there were documented cases of a death due to peanut allergy passed by touch. Didn't a high school student die after kissing her boyfriend who had eaten a peanut butter cracker or some such?
Yes, but that case is in some dispute if I'm remembering it right. The girl also had asthma and that was thought to be a bigger factor than the kiss.

[Maple Leafs]

If we all grew up watching a friend writhing in pain and dying on the classroom floor, or heard stories of our children's classmates doing the same, if we saw a bully stick a peanut in a kid's mouth and stood helplessly as he died before us, there would be absolutely no resistance to a strict and cumbersome preventative actions. No one wants children to suffer.

But none of us have seen that
Sure. But the "where was this when I was a kid?" argument doesn't get you very far. Nobody is disputing that food allergy diagnosis are much more common now than they were when we were kids. We don't know why. It's possible that they're now being overdiagnosed. It's possible that they were previously underdiagnosed. It's possible that something has changed in our environment or culture that's triggered the rise (diet? processed food? maternal habits? hygeine hypothesis? something else? some combination?)

I didn't know any autistic kids when I was growing up. That doesn't mean the 1-in-70 boys being diagnosed now are all faking it. Diagnosis rates change.

... and no one here has done a scientific study verifying the real severity of these allergies.
None of us are qualified to do that. Doctors and scientists are, and there's not a lot of dissent among them as to the severity of the problem.

So we're all forced to take on faith what a doctor, parent, the internet or our anecdotal evidence tells us. And for many of us, what doctors and parents may say doesn't jive with our anecotal experience, so therein lies the conflict.
I hope you'll take me at my word when I say that I don't mean this as a wiseass, but... if you're experiencing a conflict because the scientific consensus doesn't match with your anecdotal experience, you should probably rethink things. It's not a big leap from there to winding up staking out a position with the Jenny McCarthy crazies.

So I think a lot of us, when trying to resolve this mental conflict, probably instead believe (correctly or not) that most allergy diagnoses are either incorrect or overstated. There is a small minority for which this is serious business, but for most it is simply overkill.
That absolutely makes sense and you're actually probably right. It's probably true that most kids with peanut allergies do not have an allergy serious enough to make these sorts of measures worthwhile (and I'm talking about the standard school response, not extreme cases like the one in the original article).

But the catch is that, with today's science, there's no way to know which kids are at risk and which aren't. We can only get a yes/no diagnosis, not one that measures severity. The day we can get that test, a lot of this will go away.

But until then, we're stuck with the overkill option. Just like it will almost certainly turn out to be a waste of time for you to do up your seatbelt on your drive home home tonight, but you still will, because it just makes sense given the relatively minor effort compared to the risk involved.

[NorvTurnerOverdrive]

i don't have a dog in this fight. but i was interested so i checked with the oracle. from wiki:

The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asthma_and_Allergy_Foundation_of_America) estimates that peanut allergy is one of the most common cause of food-related death.

However, there is an increasing body of medical opinion that, while there definitely are food sensitivities, the dramatic uptick in frequency of nut allergies and more particularly the measures taken in response to the threat show elements of mass psychogenic illness (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_psychogenic_illness), hysterical reactions grossly out of proportion to the level of danger: (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/15/are-nut-bans-promoting-hysteria/)

"Dr. Christakis points out that about 3.3 million Americans are allergic to nuts, and even more — 6.9 million — are allergic to seafood. But of 30 million hospitalizations each year, just 2,000 are due to food allergies, and about 150 people die annually from serious allergic food reactions. That’s the same number of people killed by bee stings and lightning strikes combined. About 10,000 children are hospitalized annually with traumatic brain injuries from sports, 2,000 children drown each year, and about 1,300 die in gun accidents, he writes." <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-15">[ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peanut_allergy#cite_note-15)</sup>Media sensationalism has also been blamed. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peanut_allergy#cite_note-15)
...
In America, about 10 people per year die from peanut allergies.

[lighthousekeeper]

I hope you'll take me at my word when I say that I don't mean this as a wiseass, but... if you're experiencing a conflict because the scientific consensus doesn't match with your anecdotal experience, you should probably rethink things. It's not a big leap from there to winding up staking out a position with the Jenny McCarthy crazies.

eh, I still think there's a middle ground there somewhere for us sane people to still practice doubt judiciously when listening to those that 'know more'. We all learn the hard way to not believe everything we're told, otherwise every trip to the mechanic would cost us $3,000, every real estate agent would get 6%, etc.

But until then, we're stuck with the overkill option. Just like it will almost certainly turn out to be a waste of time for you to do up your seatbelt on your drive home home tonight, but you still will, because it just makes sense given the relatively minor effort compared to the risk involved.
Actually I'm one of those complete dumbasses who doesn't; I also bristle at the idea of child safety seats, bike helmets, and any kind of insurance (health, life, car). Different people approach risk differently - some try to mitigate and avoid as much as possible, others take the opposite approach, revelling in the tiny gains realized at each ignored risk avoided. Not defending my stupidity here - just pointing out different outlooks. Taken to a silly extreme: A peanut nazi would force me to do more for another person than I would even do for myself or my own loved ones.

[Autumn]

And our society forces Christian Scientists to do more for their children than they would otherwise choose. There are many occasions where we govern risk as a society rather than as individuals.

[Ben E Lou]

Every peanut allergy is a life-threatening one. That's what makes them so difficult to manage.

So you're saying that, if your child was one of the hundreds of thousands with this relatively common condition, you would... what, exactly? Never let them out of the house? And you're framing this as some sort of appeal to practicality?Maybe I'm missing something here then. I got the impression from this thread that some children have such severe allergies that if they were to be exposed to a parent who had just spent 45 minutes in a heavy peanut environment that death is quite likely, so extreme measures like the ones in the article are necessary for survival. And I got the impression that others' allergies are more mild (like the kid at my daughter's school,) so all that's necessary is that the parents in his specific class don't send their kids to school with a peanut butter sandwich. If that's not the case, then yes, it's more difficult than that. But I stand by my statement that if my kid had such an allergy where minimal exposure would put her at very high risk for death, then yeah, we're figuring out some different ways to do life.


You rely on the "dumb masses" to keep your kid alive every day. You rely on them to not drive through red lights, or fall asleep during their shift as a lifeguard, or remember that they're not supposed to let the kids drink from the beaker in chemistry class. You "stake your child's very LIFE" on other people all the time. Nobody tells you to keep your kid at sealed up at home until you can figure out a way to reduce the risk to absolute zero.See above. It's all about the *level* of risk involved. Again, if I've misinterpreted the level of risk (or if the level of risk has been misrepresented,) then my assessment of the situation would be different.
Parents of kids with allergies can't win. If we ask for some basic help from the community, we're over-protecting our kids and living in fear. If we try to make reasonable compromises, we're negligent parents endangering our children.Hate to sound like a broken record, but it's again back to the thought that all levels of allergy aren't the same. Basic help such as I've outlined previously is reasonable. Anyone who states otherwise is wrong.
(And as far as the specific scenario you outlined, it's really not difficult. You go to the school and get your sick child. You're making this out to be some sort of terrible dilemma. It's not. Go get your kid.)You're not following me, then. No dilemma at all. My point is that I'm going to the school to get my kid, and it's very likely in that scenario that so much is on my mind that I completely forget that there's another kid that I'm putting in death's way when I walk in those doors. I'm saying that it doesn't take someone being insensitive or rude or malicious or even thoughtless to introduce a deadly substance into the environment; it just takes the wrong set of circumstances. And the circumstances I'm talking about aren't particularly far-fetched. As I'm sure you're very well aware, there are tons of places out there with tons of parents eating in them with a high concentration of peanut products.

[B & B]

Actually I'm one of those complete dumbasses who doesn't; I also bristle at the idea of child safety seats, bike helmets, and any kind of insurance (health, life, car). Different people approach risk differently - some try to mitigate and avoid as much as possible, others take the opposite approach, revelling in the tiny gains realized at each ignored risk avoided. Not defending my stupidity here - just pointing out different outlooks. Taken to a silly extreme: A peanut nazi would force me to do more for another person than I would even do for myself or my own loved ones.



This. At least to some extent. Live life. Dont worry about hedging every perceived risk, real or imagined. Do stupid shit every now and then to make sure youre still alive. If you cant remember a half dozen things you did as a kid that seem absolutely bat shit crazy now then blame your parents.

I dont like most folks with food allergies just like I dont like most people who cant order off the menu without making 14 changes and substitutions, or asking half a dozen questions. Stop trying to order the Thai peanut spring rolls if you have an allergy and have to ask about preparation, sauces, and peanut oil. Get a damn salad, or something else and make everyones life easier. Its a meal.

[BishopMVP]

I think 4 of the 6 elementary/middle schools in town are now peanut-free or nut-free environments. And I'm perfectly willing to draw the line where Ben (and others) have - if you have to ask parents not to send in any peanut-based products and want to make sure every teacher/administrator is educated on the matter, ok, but if the child is going to die from breathing in air from someone who has recently eaten a product with nuts in it, they should be home-schooled.

[sterlingice]

This. At least to some extent. Live life. Dont worry about hedging every perceived risk, real or imagined. Do stupid shit every now and then to make sure youre still alive. If you cant remember a half dozen things you did as a kid that seem absolutely bat shit crazy now then blame your parents.

"Living life" is not really a binary choice- either you "live life" or you "live cautiously". For instance, I wear a seat belt because I make the call that the small amount of inconvenience is worth mitigating the risk. However, if I were given a choice between flying on Super Corporate Frisk-a-lot and Backscatter X-Ray Protection Airline vs Big Larry's All-We-Have-is-a-Metal-Detector Airline, I'd fly with Larry. Why? Because, in my mind, the risk/reward of a seat belt (a few seconds and 40K dead per year) is far different than the risk/reward of TSA policies (two hours of hassle for one 3K person incident 10 years ago).

I don't get to make that choice, tho. We all live in a social contract and, as a society, decide what is an acceptable risk. We elect people who write laws that, in theory, a majority of people agree with and if we don't like it- we vote for someone else to rewrite those laws. Or we elect or elect people who nominate judges to interpret these laws.

You can't just say "let me live my life" because there's always going to be that middle of the Venn Diagram where your life intersects someone else's and there has to be a mechanism in place so that's why we have laws.

SI

[CrimsonFox]

The question is ARE people actually more susceptible to life-threatening allergies nowadays and are allergy symptoms as a whole getting worse? Or have there always been these kinds of cases about?

I've always felt that medicine as a whole simply deals with odds. If MOST people react a certain way, then that's how doctors diagnose.

Allergies, though, there are mild cases and extreme cases. I think the way we treat illnesses has changed. When I was in high school it seemed teachers didn't give a crap about specific illnesses kids had and how doing specific activities would threaten their health. (especially the idiot P.E. teachers)

Now it seems people build monuments to people with strange illnesses.
I think, for the kid's own safety, they should have that kid eat their lunch in a different place than everyone else and allow their friends to eat with them. There's no way you can make sure people don't have peanut butter in the main lunchroom.

[Lathum]

Actually I'm one of those complete dumbasses who doesn't; I also bristle at the idea of child safety seats, bike helmets, and any kind of insurance (health, life, car). Different people approach risk differently - some try to mitigate and avoid as much as possible, others take the opposite approach, revelling in the tiny gains realized at each ignored risk avoided. Not defending my stupidity here - just pointing out different outlooks. Taken to a silly extreme: A peanut nazi would force me to do more for another person than I would even do for myself or my own loved ones.

You don't want to wear a seatbelt and risk killing yourself that is your business, but child safety seats? You would really put your child at risk?

Also, not having insurance is a risk. The problem is when you can't pay for yout 70K appendix surgery the cost results in the rest of us having higher rates, which makes you kind of an ass IMO.

There is a difference between taking risks and being irresponsible. People who don't do things to keep their children safe or those who don't have insurance fall into the later catergory, IMO.

[JonInMiddleGA]

... but child safety seats? You would really put your child at risk?

Again, common sense comes into play. The current proposal in Georgia is to raise the raise to EIGHT, which is one of the most idiotic fucking things I've ever heard.

[tarcone]

Schools allow food from home. But in a party situation (Bday, Christmas, etc.) parents have to bring store bought items. But they have to be nut-free. Or, if not, the peanut allergy student isnt in the room or is and doesnt eat. Most parents will bring nut-free. No one wants to leave a kid out.

But, if s child will die because my daughter decided to eat peanut butter toast for breakfast and she breathes on another child, or Ben eats a peanut based product and rushes to school to get his sick child and the deathly allergic child is in the nurses office also. The child needs to be at home in an environment that is safe and healthy for that child.

I dont know why it is so important that a school has to change its entire culture and atmosphere for one child. Sure its free public education for all. But is it worth it?

Or are the parents looking for a lawsuit?

[tarcone]

Again, common sense comes into play. The current proposal in Georgia is to raise the raise to EIGHT, which is one of the most idiotic fucking things I've ever heard.

What about keeping children in rear-facing child seats until 2? My daughters would have been folded in half in one of those.

[bronconick]

Again, common sense comes into play. The current proposal in Georgia is to raise the raise to EIGHT, which is one of the most idiotic fucking things I've ever heard.

One of the parents on my facebook feed recently posted some article suggesting kids stay in a booster seat until age 12 or 5 feet tall. I laughed.

[B & B]

Again, common sense comes into play. The current proposal in Georgia is to raise the raise to EIGHT, which is one of the most idiotic fucking things I've ever heard.

By age 8 I was learning to drive on dirt backroads.

Only 100 years ago less than 5% of the U.S. population was born in a hospital. Maybe if Uncle Bob or the midwife there in the house for the birthing had just eaten some peanut butter the kid doenst make it. They certainly werent wearing masks in that sterile environment and things worked out just fine. While harsh, maybe thats for the best. Theres something to be said about survival of the fittest. Just a few generations after common homebirthing and you cant breathe peanut dust on some allergic freakazoid kid without a near death experience.

[JonInMiddleGA]

What about keeping children in rear-facing child seats until 2? My daughters would have been folded in half in one of those.

I'm not a fan of the car seats in general frankly, as I find them to be poorly conceived torture devices intended to create as much aggravation as possible for both parent & child, as well as to cause back problems for parents forced to find a way to wrangle children into them while working in a confined space that forces poor lifting techniques. One of the happiest days of my life in the past 12 years was when my son was finally legally free of the damned things.

They're one of only two things in my life that I've ever actually considered trying to find someone to help invent/engineer improvements in (the other being durable yet fashionable plastic clothes that make it easy to simply hose a child down after feeding time.

[sterlingice]

By age 8 I was learning to drive on dirt backroads.

Only 100 years ago less than 5% of the U.S. population was born in a hospital. Maybe if Uncle Bob or the midwife there in the house for the birthing had just eaten some peanut butter the kid doenst make it. They certainly werent wearing masks in that sterile environment and things worked out just fine. While harsh, maybe thats for the best. Theres something to be said about survival of the fittest. Just a few generations after common homebirthing and you cant breathe peanut dust on some allergic freakazoid kid without a near death experience.

Fertility and Mortality in the United States | Economic History Services (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/haines.demography)

Um... to be fair, the infant mortality rate in 1900 was 110/170 (depending on ethnicity) per 1000 compared to 5/14 now.

So, yeah, turns out that sterile environment takes the rate of your kid dying at birth from 1 in 10 (or 6) to 1 in 200 (or 100). So maybe that sterile environment helps just a smidge, you know, to the tune of, I dunno, 20 times as much.

So, yeah, out of every 1000 kids, 105 (or 154) kindof don't think the old way "turned out just fine".

SI

[Maple Leafs]

Maybe I'm missing something here then. I got the impression from this thread that some children have such severe allergies that if they were to be exposed to a parent who had just spent 45 minutes in a heavy peanut environment that death is quite likely, so extreme measures like the ones in the article are necessary for survival. And I got the impression that others' allergies are more mild (like the kid at my daughter's school,) so all that's necessary is that the parents in his specific class don't send their kids to school with a peanut butter sandwich.
Fair enough. You framed your argument around kids with "life-threatening" allergies. All peanut allergies, even mild ones, can fall into that category.

You and several others in this thread say you're open to accomodating less severe allergies, but would balk at those like the one described in Florida. That's reasonable. Just be aware that when your child comes home with a note about a new kid in class with an allergy, there's a 99% chance they're talking about the former group.

That's why stories like this one from Florida are, ultimately, not all that helpful to parents of peanut allergy kids. I guarantee that next September, thousands of parents will think backto this story and immediately go on the defensive when their school starts talking about precautions.

[Maple Leafs]

This. At least to some extent. Live life. Dont worry about hedging every perceived risk, real or imagined. Do stupid shit every now and then to make sure youre still alive. If you cant remember a half dozen things you did as a kid that seem absolutely bat shit crazy now then blame your parents.

Hey, if you believe that kids today are over-caudled and soft, wonderful, many people would agree with you. If you want to make it your mission to change that, then go ahead. But do it for your kids. Don't conveniently draw your line on an issue that impacts the safety of my child and not yours.

[Maple Leafs]

The question is ARE people actually more susceptible to life-threatening allergies nowadays and are allergy symptoms as a whole getting worse? Or have there always been these kinds of cases about?
That's absolutely the right question.

Ultimately, my guess is it's a bit of both. There's no doubt that the criteria for diagnosis food allergies has widened, so in that sense there are definitely kids being diagnosed today who wouldn't have been a generation ago. And while some parents wouldn't agree with me, I think it's almost certainly true that there are kids being diagnosed today who are false positives, and don't really have an allergy worth worrying about.

But it doesn't seem to be just that. Something is making kids more susceptible to these allergies. The person who figures out what will probably end up very rich. But so far we don't have any answers.

Meanwhile, as much as the question is important, never forget to put yourself in the shoes of the parents. We've had a doctor look us in the eye and tell us our child has a life-threatening medical condition. Maybe the doctor's wrong. Let's hope he is. But what would you do if you were me? Do you want to take a chance that your kid might be one of the lucky ones?

[tarcone]

That's absolutely the right question.

Ultimately, my guess is it's a bit of both. There's no doubt that the criteria for diagnosis food allergies has widened, so in that sense there are definitely kids being diagnosed today who wouldn't have been a generation ago. And while some parents wouldn't agree with me, I think it's almost certainly true that there are kids being diagnosed today who are false positives, and don't really have an allergy worth worrying about.

But it doesn't seem to be just that. Something is making kids more susceptible to these allergies. The person who figures out what will probably end up very rich. But so far we don't have any answers.

Meanwhile, as much as the question is important, never forget to put yourself in the shoes of the parents. We've had a doctor look us in the eye and tell us our child has a life-threatening medical condition. Maybe the doctor's wrong. Let's hope he is. But what would you do if you were me? Do you want to take a chance that your kid might be one of the lucky ones?


Home school the child.

[Buccaneer]

Sorry to go back to a OT post but I had never heard of school not allowing outside food, in any grades. This would cover all of the experiences in Colorado, Arizona, Oregon and California.

Marginally related but last year, my son was in a hostile Jr. High school environment. Instead of trying to get everyone to conform, we changed his environment (to another school).

[SteveMax58]

Meanwhile, as much as the question is important, never forget to put yourself in the shoes of the parents. We've had a doctor look us in the eye and tell us our child has a life-threatening medical condition. Maybe the doctor's wrong. Let's hope he is. But what would you do if you were me? Do you want to take a chance that your kid might be one of the lucky ones?

I guess that's kind of the point. No...I wouldn't take that chance at all with my kid so I wouldn't put him/her in that environment with so many variables at play if I truly felt that trace elements of peanut dust could possibly kill them. I would, in no way, see changing the daily behaviors of every other person in their environment as an option...or a chance , if you will...that I could be comfortable with.

I don't think that is saying anything bad about people today. As Ben, Jon & others have said...people will make accommodations where common sense & reasonable levels of logic apply. I guess if you live in a 100 person village or something you could possibly get everybody to be aware & onboard (even then I'd have my doubts)...but not in a 10k + population town or larger. I simply wouldn't be able to take that risk on behalf of my kid...again, if I believed merely breathing the dust could trigger death.

It might also say something about different people as well. I tend to think that my problems (or by proxy, my family's) are mine to deal with and to the extent possible I don't want to ask others to do anything special for me. I simply don't like being a source of burden to others as I realize & respect they all have their own issues & burdens to deal with. I guess I kind of expect others to feel the same & not ask me to go to extreme levels of burden for them, especially when I do not know them.

Having said that...I do believe it is reasonable to ask kids/parents sharing classes with my child to not bring in peanut-sourced foods to the extent they can help it. I would like to think at least 1/5 of them will comply daily, and as such, would think it reasonable for my child to have a table where some of the 1/5 can eat with them. In return for such thoughtfulness of those parents/kids...I think I would be inclined to treat them to a peanut-free lunch once a week/month/bi-monthly or whatever I could afford to do as a sign of appreciation for what they have done to make things more comfortable for my child. Again...this assumes my child is not so severely allergic to the point that I believe they could die from simply being near trace amounts of peanut dust.

I guess its a bit of ...give respect/get respect in my mind. I respect that other families have burdens of their own to live with and for those who can make reasonable accommodations for my child, great. But I would never even consider the concept that everybody else should radically change their lives & eating habits to accommodate the issues/burdens I (and my family) have to deal with daily. Maybe I'm old school or something...but it's just disrespectful if you ask me.

[stevew]

They need to remake Macauley Caulkin's My Girl and this time have the adorable boy be allergic to peanuts. I'm foreseeing a slow mo cam where a vendor at Yankee stadium tosses a bag of nuts to someone on the upper deck....it breaks open and a nut falls from the sky into his soda and he dies.

Can I get a greenlight?

[stevew]

Sorry to go back to a OT post but I had never heard of school not allowing outside food, in any grades. This would cover all of the experiences in Colorado, Arizona, Oregon and California.

Marginally related but last year, my son was in a hostile Jr. High school environment. Instead of trying to get everyone to conform, we changed his environment (to another school).

In our case you can send a packed lunch. But they disallow food for parties/birthdays.

[RendeR]

Both of my kids attend public school. My sons Pre-K class is so small he usually has to take snacks in for the whole class 2 days out of the month (they rotate through the kids). My daughter's class is larger (Kindergarten) and she takes an all class snack once a month.

We've never been told NOT to send any tyupe of thing and the snacks we generally pick up are boxed varity packs of nabisco crackers/cookies which are guarenteed to have some peanut issues (Nutter butters anyone?)

That said, the school, teachers and assistants are aware of allergy issues in their classrooms and ensure that there are appropriate snacks and precautions in place for kids with allergies. I do not know if anyone in their school has a life threatening allergy so I can't really comment on teh severity issue and how they would deal with that.


As for MaleLeafs blanket statement that all peanut allergies are life threatening, umm..they're not. From direct consultation with multiple doctors, pediatricians and PA's Nurses etc during our kids growing stages.

Allergies to nuts in general can range from a simple rash to death and everything in between. Saying that all of them are life threatening is exactly the fear mongering hysteria that creates the division between people on this topic. Please stop spreading misinformation.

[lighthousekeeper]

Both of my kids attend public school. My sons Pre-K class is so small he usually has to take snacks in for the whole class 2 days out of the month (they rotate through the kids). My daughter's class is larger (Kindergarten) and she takes an all class snack once a month.

We've never been told NOT to send any tyupe of thing and the snacks we generally pick up are boxed varity packs of nabisco crackers/cookies which are guarenteed to have some peanut issues (Nutter butters anyone?)

I sometimes wish I could climb into a time machine and travel back 20 years to present-day Buffalo.

[RendeR]

Are you wishing for the easier less anally retentive lifestyle that we enjoy here or are you being an asshole and insulting my home by saying its 20 years behind the times? You didn't properly notate your fascetiousness or sarcasm, depending on the PoV.

[molson]

Are you wishing for the easier less anally retentive lifestyle that we enjoy here or are you being an asshole and insulting my home by saying its 20 years behind the times? You didn't properly notate your fascetiousness or sarcasm, depending on the PoV.

Ya, god forbid someone lower themselves to insult an entire area....what kind of person would do such a thing? - :rolleyes:

[RendeR]

Ya, god forbid someone lower themselves to insult an entire area....what kind of person would do such a thing? - :rolleyes:


Hey I never said I wasn't an asshole for insulting New England (god forbid you create an issue where there was none), then again, being an asshole doesn't prove you wrong. I just want to be sure which angle he was coming from.

[Maple Leafs]

Allergies to nuts in general can range from a simple rash to death and everything in between. Saying that all of them are life threatening is exactly the fear mongering hysteria that creates the division between people on this topic. Please stop spreading misinformation.
No. Allergic reactions can range from a simple rash to death and everything in between. And some people are more likely to have a severe reaction than others. But if you have a peanut allergy, there's no way to know whether your reaction to a particular exposure will be mild or deadly. So no, not all reactions are life-threatening, but you never know which ones will be. All allergies are potentially life-threatening.

[RainMaker]

No. Allergic reactions can range from a simple rash to death and everything in between. And some people are more likely to have a severe reaction than others. But if you have a peanut allergy, there's no way to know whether your reaction to a particular exposure will be mild or deadly. So no, not all reactions are life-threatening, but you never know which ones will be. All allergies are potentially life-threatening.
And there is no way to know if a kid who has a headache really has a brain aneurysm. But we don't rush every single kid with one to the hospital in an ambulance and run a battery of tests on them.

I guess what I think many people are saying is that there is a disproportionate response to this. I completely understand having an allergy and making sure your kid doesn't consume something with peanuts at school. But the dust thing is overboard, especially since we've never had anyone die from that. And that if someone really could die from inhaling some air particles, they probably shouldn't be in the classroom.

I'm curious what response you think is appropriate for kids who are allergic to bees. They kill much more kids than peanuts do.

[bronconick]

There was some discussion in here about schools banning lunches brought from home, I think

Chicago school bans homemade lunches, the latest in national food fight - Yahoo! News (http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110411/us_yblog_thelookout/chicago-school-bans-homemade-lunches-the-latest-in-national-food-fight)

Students who attend Chicago's Little Village Academy public school get nothing but nutritional tough love during their lunch period each day. The students can either eat the cafeteria food--or go hungry. Only students with allergies are allowed to bring a homemade lunch to school, the Chicago Tribune reports (http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/yblog_thelookout/us_yblog_thelookout/storytext/chicago-school-bans-homemade-lunches-the-latest-in-national-food-fight/41044975/SIG=13hmnhkic/*http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/education/ct-met-school-lunch-restrictions-041120110410,0,2614451,full.story).

I'm pretty unsurprised by this, since I don't think I could have a lower opinion of school "administration" in general.

[wade moore]

Would love to see the menu.

As I said earlier in the thread, this would be a HUGE deal to me, but it could be lessened if it was ACTUALLY a healthy lunch. What i see from elementary school lunches is completely unhealthy slop for the most part.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Let's not forget about another factor here

Any school that bans homemade lunches also puts more money in the pockets of the district's food provider, Chartwells-Thompson. The federal government pays the district for each free or reduced-price lunch taken, and the caterer receives a set fee from the district per lunch.

[tyketime]

There was some discussion in here about schools banning lunches brought from home, I think

Chicago school bans homemade lunches, the latest in national food fight - Yahoo! News (http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110411/us_yblog_thelookout/chicago-school-bans-homemade-lunches-the-latest-in-national-food-fight)



I'm pretty unsurprised by this, since I don't think I could have a lower opinion of school "administration" in general.
While I share your low sentiments on school administration, I do find it hard to believe they were able to force this on everyone.

[wade moore]

Based on doing some reading on this, I'd really have to start thinking about Private School if this happened to a school that a child of mine went to.

I'd first fight it like hell, but man. Looks like they provide "healthy" meals. Their definition of healthy appears to a) not taste good and b) not really be all that healthy.

I don't tend to get on the rants about government being too involved in our personal lives, but this is seriously over stepping bounds imo.

[Maple Leafs]

Just for clarity, that Chicago decision has nothing to do with food allergies. It appears that they're trying to sell it as a health/nutrition decision.

[wade moore]

Just for clarity, that Chicago decision has nothing to do with food allergies. It appears that they're trying to sell it as a health/nutrition decision.

Yeah, that should be pointed out more clearly in the thread and is part of what gets me so fired up about it.

It's not an allergy safety issue, but rather that their trying to force kids to eat "healthy".

Ironically enough, children with allergies are the only ones allowed to bring in a lunch.

[Passacaglia]

I bet it's fairly easy to get a doctor's note that would excuse your kid from this requirement (though I doubt many of the parents of kids at this school will bother).

[molson]

I bet it's fairly easy to get a doctor's note that would excuse your kid from this requirement (though I doubt many of the parents of kids at this school will bother).

I was thinking that. Every U.S. kid has an "allergy" or "food sensitivity" of some type (and 3 disorders that explain why they don't like homework).

[wade moore]

I bet it's fairly easy to get a doctor's note that would excuse your kid from this requirement (though I doubt many of the parents of kids at this school will bother).

Perhaps, but that's just silly to do that.

[wade moore]

What I mean is - you shouldn't have to go through that silly hoop.

[Maple Leafs]

Ironically enough, children with allergies are the only ones allowed to bring in a lunch.
Which implies that the lunches they're forcing kids to buy aren't actually allergy-safe.

So everyone gets to be mad!

[sterlingice]

So, can kids allergic to, say, strawberries, bring a peanut butter, gluten, and shellfish sandwich to school?

SI

[molson]

So, can kids allergic to, say, strawberries, bring a peanut butter, gluten, and shellfish sandwich to school?



YUM!