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I have to admit that many years ago, the first time I heard that airlines had replaced peanuts with pretzels for the safety of their allergic passengers, I rolled my eyes. “Everybody’s so worried about liability these days,” I remember remarking, smugly snacking on a peanut-butter sandwich and peanut-oil-fried potato chips with nary a worry about anaphylaxis.
Then I became a parent myself and bothered to look at the facts. According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology, 1.1% of the population is allergic to peanuts and/or other tree nuts (like walnuts, cashews and almonds). More children (8%) than adults (2%) have food allergies, and that number is growing—it doubled over the last decade. Food allergies can be deadly, and peanut allergies are especially dangerous. And children do not tend to outgrow life-threatening nut allergies: the only solution is to avoid all nuts, in any form—including nut oils, nut butters, and teeny-tiny nut particles.
While I understand that having to overhaul your snack cabinet is a drag, I couldn’t believe that some parents would be so unfeeling as to suggest that an allergic child never go anywhere to spare the rest of us the hassle of dealing with him. But reading some websites and blogs about food allergies, I ran across many jaw-dropping comments, like the following:
"We cannot become a dictatorship. If parents are so worried about the allergies they should home school their children and not go out in public.”And
“Peanuts are shown to increase brain function and also mental alertness. They have special elements that are essential to a developing mind…it is a huge inconvenience for all the parents to try to read all the labels and change their whole way of life.”
Seriously? Peanuts as a way of life? Kids should stay isolated at home because the rest of us can’t bear to be apart from our Snickers and brain-boosting Planter’s for a few hours?
It's not about being dictated to, it's about making choices that are as much about the good of others as my own convenience (something I would love for my kids to learn by example).
While it would be very easy for me to sit here with my four (thus far) allergy-free kids and complain about being inconvenienced by another child’s food restrictions, what do I really have to complain about? If my boys’ school implemented a no-nut policy next year, I’d have to come up with a creative solution to the everyday PBJ. Big deal. At the end of the day, my kids could come home and eat whatever they wanted without my having to worry about their windpipes swelling up if they accidentally ate (or, possibly even worse, if I accidentally served) the wrong thing.
But for kids with deadly allergies? Their parents can never really relax. Any social situation or public meal has the potential to turn scary and dangerous. I can only hope that if I ever had a child with a similar condition, other people would get over their “need” for nuts and show a little compassion.
No, there's no such thing as a 100% safe environment for a child with a serious food allergy (a fact their parents are likely well aware of.) And yes, allergic kids will eventually need to learn to navigate the big scary peanut-ridden world around them. But not when they’re 3. And while a peanut-allergic child will eventually have to learn to control his own environment and keep himself safe, as a school-aged kid I figure he’s entitled to a little leeway—as well as a social life and an education—while he’s figuring it out.
Making a school environment just a little bit safer for kids with life-threatening allergies isn’t coddling or dictating or giving preferential treatment.
It’s basic human decency. Which do we value more highly: our children, or our Jif?
Think parents of nut-allergic kids are just being hysterical and high-drama? Before you spout off, educate yourself on what food allergies are (and aren’t), how serious they really can be, and how you can help create a safer environment for your child or her allergic friends. Visit these websites for more information:
- www.foodallergy.org
- www.kidswithfoodallergies.org www.aaaai.org
--Meagan Francis also spouts off at her blog, www.meaganfrancis.com/blog
