Children are banned from eating Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwiches at school

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
How about the allergic kids eat in a different room? Or on the other side of the cafeteria? Or use the cafeteria first? I'm sure the concern is cross contamination. Perhaps they should look at their cleanliness issues. I could think of a lot of solutions short of BANNING Mr. Peanut...

Well... On doctor's recommendations, we had to buy Epipen syringes just in case. The kind that you stab in the thigh in case your kid goes under after been accidentally exposed to peanuts. That syringe is not unlike military antidote kits. We never had to use it, thank God, but just having to deal with it changes the way you think. And then there was that case when a girl died after kissing her boyfriend who just ate a peanut butter bar.

I know it may sound ridiculous, but hell I sure don't want to take chances.

reply to post by James1982


There is nothing hilarious, flippant or novel about food allergies. My daughter was allergic to soy, peanuts, tree nuts, melons and it was life threatening.

She went to a large school built one hundred years ago and they ate lunch in the classrooms. I had to go once a month and scrub the desks books and fixtures---alone and single handedly. Bringing peanut butter to school is dangerous because the oils do not wash off easily. They are residual and this is very dangerous to someone with an allergy.

Grow up- it is just as easy to send a cheese, turkey or bologna sandwich as it is peanut butter. But those won't KILL someone.

Originally posted by kaylaluv

Originally posted by Hefficide
And, oh, BTW, airlines voluntarily do not use peanut products. Why? Because they don't want to be sued over an avoidable medical situation. Why should a public school have less of a right to protect itself and it's "customers" than a corporation?

It's common sense. And there's no common sense in absolutist argument.

~Heff

Ahh yes, but people are allowed to bring and eat peanut products on the plane, no? I can see the school not serving peanut products, but to tell a child's parents that they are not allowed to bring a pb&j from home is totally different.

ALMOST BANNED, but the ban failed on a technicality.

Makes sense to me. I love peanuts, but I don't want to harm anyone anyhow.

reply to post by buddhasystem


I agree that epipens are a necessary and great tool. My problem is that a 2nd or 3rd grader is prone to not want to use one and may not be self-aware enough to truly recognize and understand the early stages of reaction.

Heck, even as a 46 year old adult, sometimes my allergy kicks in and it takes me awhile to put 2 and 2 together and realize that I'm going into anaphalaxis.

~Heff

reply to post by Missing Blue Sky


Thank you for sharing.

I agree with you. As i said before, people seem to be under the mind set that because this issue does not effect the majority, making comprises to ensure safe and comfortable education for all students, not just the majority seems un acceptable to them.

I for one think the major issue at hand is ensuring equality when it comes to health and safety insteading of equality in what each kids wants to bring for a snack.

Some of the nah sayers have dropped off, so we may be gaining traction here

Originally posted by MDDoxs
reply to post by thisguyrighthere

 

Peanut allergies are more common then you think.

THe problem is that even a smell of them can set some individuals off. Additionally, if you reaction is siginificant to warrent carrying around an epi pe, its there to safe your life.

I do know about you, but i certainly would not want to risk my life every time i went to school.

Edit: Here are some quick stats

Peanut allergy is one of the "Big 8" food allergies that account for 90% of those suffered by 21 million Americans. (AAAAI and FAAN)
More than 3 million people in the United States report being allergic to peanuts, tree nuts or both. (AAAAI)
Approximately 1% of the U.S. population has a peanut allergy (Sicherer, SH, "Prevalence of peanut and tree nut allergy in the US...")
Less than 21% of patients with peanut allergy will outgrow it. (AAAAI)
Peanut Allergy is the most common cause of food related death (AAFA).
Four out of every 100 children have a food allergy. (CDC/NCHS Study, "Food Allergy Among U.S. Children...")
From 1997 to 2007, the prevalence of reported food allergy increased 18% among children under age 18 years. (CDC/NCHS Study, "Food Allergy Among U.S. Children...")
From 2004 to 2006, there were an average of 9,537 hospital discharges per year with a diagnosis related to food allergy among children 0 to 17 years. (CDC/NCHS Study, "Food Allergy Among U.S. Children...")

www.peanutallergy.com...#

edit on 14-9-2012 by MDDoxs because: (no reason given)

Thank you for injecting some rational thought into this thread. My kids have a severe peanut allergy and will soon face this same dilemma when they hit the cafeteria for the first time next year. We found out about their allergy by pure accident when we gave them a small bight of what we thought was a standard chocolate chip cookie from a bakery when they were two years old.

Not long after eating just a small bite they started to break out in hives all over their bodies. Eyes began to swell as did their ears and we rushed off to the ER to treat them both with benedryl and epinephrine.

Turns out the cookie was improperly labeled and was actually a peanut butter choc. chip cookie. That's how we found out about their unknown allergy. It scared me senseless!!! Some people are sensitive enough to react to airborn peanut debris around them especially on airplane flights...

Neither my wife or I are allergic to nuts of any kind and when we were kids a peanut allergy was unheard of. Something has drastically changed since then. There are now 5 kids in my daughters kindergarten class with peanut allergies. Its Bizarre... and in an evironment with kids eating messy PB&J there is always a risk of bringing the peanut butter back to classroom or on the playground via the kids clothes or their hands or around their mouths given the way kids eat...

Its a worry that I would rather not have.... My kids have epipens at the ready with the school nurse and in the classroom and that's the best we can do to keep them safe. They know to stay away from peanuts directly but the unknowns are always out there no matter where they go...

I hope they will some day outgrow it but the numbers are not in their favor. Peanut allergies are rarely outgrown...

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters
reply to post by DontTreadOnMe

 

I can't speak for all kids, but in relation to my mothers allergy, it's peanuts, something in them. Peanut butter, peanut oil, peanuts, all of these can cause a reaction. I've seen it. It's scary.

Yes - peanuts are a very serious allergy. They're not actually nuts. They're a legume that grows in the ground. Nuts grow in trees.

I understand the not allowing peanuts in the classroom - - class parties etc. As a matter-of-fact my granddaughter's school does not allow lunch pails or any snack food in the classroom. They are in "cubbies" outside the room.

I agree with the having an allergy safe table or area in the lunchroom or where ever. Deal with the bullying.

Partner the younger kids with a volunteer older kid to ward off any thoughts of harassment.

reply to post by jibeho


Thank you for the compliment.

I had an allergy to peanuts but thankfully grew out of it, additionally i had a ex gf that was deadly allergic to them, and i was worried to death a lot of the time that something woud trigger a reaction.

No one deserves to live in perpetual fear for their lives....especially in a PUBLIC school.

Welcome to this side of the debate

It'll just be a matter of time before so many things are banned, no one will want to leave the house for fear of hurting someone in some way just by being there.

I don't wish ill on any child. My daughter has egg allergies but has been more tolerant as she's gotten older and now basically just can't eat straight eggs and things with a lot of egg like mayonnaise, things like that (which, by the way is a popular condiment that people put on other kinds of sandwiches lol) . There are ways other than a straight-out ban to handle things. I'm not going to push for a ban on mayo just because some might get on my child. She only gets hives when she eats eggs, but If she was so severely allergic that just being next to someone eating mayo or an egg would trigger a reaction, I might not want her in a public school setting.

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters


i do think a ban might be a little overboard, but I also think the safety of one child outweighs your right to eat peanuts at school.

Which is of course the topic here. Is the safety of a very small minority of students as risk if some of the others happen to pack a lunch containing ingredients they may be allergic to?

I say no, and the argument is ridiculous.

If you're allergic to it, DON'T EAT IT!!

Some of you people act like poor little Johnny is gonna see some peanut butter on the gym floor and start lapping it up like a rabid dog, despite knowing it's harmful to him.

get real.

reply to post by MDDoxs


There is a small move to push soy butter on schools as an alternative to peanut butter. Does not help those kids are allergic to soy (growing problem too)
www.soybutter.com...

I prefer a peanut free campus as I am not a fan of outcast tables in the cafeterias. School is already tough enough and segregating those with food allergies certainly does not help... Plenty of alternatives for lunch beyond peanut butter...

Side note... my kids will NEVER be able to attend a Cleveland Indians game or any ML baseball game due to the peanut oils that coat the entire stadium. That's our choice not to attend and I would never expect the Indians to ban peanuts and cracker jack from the ball park... Public schools... that's a different ball game...

reply to post by HIWATT


The underlying reality is not that simple. Peanut products are very common in foods one might not suspect them to be in.

And, again, we're discussing small children. They simply lack capacity to understand many of the issues involved here. A kid who likes the taste of peanut butter is not mentally or emotionally equipped to do any sort of risk/reward assessment. They're kids. They just do.

Originally posted by jibeho
reply to post by MDDoxs

 

There is a small move to push soy butter on schools as an alternative to peanut butter. Does not help those kids are allergic to soy (growing problem too)
www.soybutter.com...

I prefer a peanut free campus as I am not a fan of outcast tables in the cafeterias. School is already tough enough and segregating those with food allergies certainly does not help... Plenty of alternatives for lunch beyond peanut butter...

Side note... my kids will NEVER be able to attend a Cleveland Indians game or any ML baseball game due to the peanut oils that coat the entire stadium. That's our choice not to attend and I would never expect the Indians to ban peanuts and cracker jack from the ball park... Public schools... that's a different ball game...

How about having a "peanut" table, where only the children who have brought pb&j sandwiches sit? There would probably be more of them, so they wouldn't feel like outcasts, and the allergic kids eat with the kids who aren't eating peanut products that day. My daughter only eats a peanut butter about once a week, so most times she would eat with the allergic kids.

Originally posted by Hefficide
reply to post by buddhasystem

 

I agree that epipens are a necessary and great tool. My problem is that a 2nd or 3rd grader is prone to not want to use one and may not be self-aware enough to truly recognize and understand the early stages of reaction.

Right on. The kids are always supervised. In school, we keep our Epipen charge in the nurse's office with a note and actual doctor's prescription. They seem to run a tight ship there, so I'm counting on that.

Originally posted by jibeho
reply to post by MDDoxs

 

There is a small move to push soy butter on schools as an alternative to peanut butter. Does not help those kids are allergic to soy (growing problem too)

Our case...

Jibeho, I'm glad that we in fact have something in common

reply to post by buddhasystem


This tables another issue, unfortunately. I'll have to source it, as I can... but I watched a Frontline On PBS a few months back that discussed the fact that, in California at least, there was only one nurse for every seven, I believe, schools.

If this is a universal situation, then epipens in nurses offices don't actually help as much as they should.

~Heff

reply to post by Hefficide


I understand that. The issue I really have with these "bans" however, are where do they stop?

It was posted earlier there has been an 18% increase in allergies in the last 10 years in school age children ( !? )

We aren't just talking about peanuts here if that is true.

That explosive increase in allergic reactions by a specific segment of our population is extremely suspicious to me. When I was in school this was almost completely unheard of.

With the advent of frankenfoods and the systematic destruction of nutrition that's happening now, I suppose this isn't surprising.... but I ask you, where does it end?

My comment likely came off as flippant. I do realize this is a serious problem for many children but you have to wonder what's at play here.

Some day soon maybe a "threshold of allergens" will be reached and some law will be passed that only food provided by the school will be available for consumption, and ALL home packed meals will be banned.

That should worry everyone. More so than this now.

Originally posted by Hefficide
reply to post by buddhasystem

 

This tables another issue, unfortunately. I'll have to source it, as I can... but I watched a Frontline On PBS a few months back that discussed the fact that, in California at least, there was only one nurse for every seven, I believe, schools

We are lucky. It's a public school (a large one) and the nurse seems like a darn serious character. She read every letter in the list of my kid's allergies and had me sign a stack of papers, then took the Epipen as one would handle a firearm, with confidence but respect nevertheless

reply to post by Hefficide


That problem is exacerbated by zero tolerance policies that say kids cant take an aspirin or their own prescribed medications unless under the direct supervision of a school nurse.

If your kid knows he has to take a pill/injection at a certain time and can take that pill/injection when he's not in school why is he suddenly relegated to dullard status once inside the school and subjected to administrative supervision and oversight?

Wonderful bureaucracy dictates you need a thing to perform an action then fails to provide adequate access to said thing. It's absurd.

reply to post by HIWATT


Agreed that there is a danger of piggybacking more controls onto the rational ones. That's what government tends to do... use a legitimate concern to then justify a lot of bad legislation. The remedy for that is what ATS thrives on... providing information and giving citizens an ability to discern and block the bad stuff back out.

Does it work? Not often. But it is becoming more common lately.

~Heff