Peanut allergy and school

no, but it doesnt mean that nuts should be banned in a school setting either.

i cannot guarentee that my dd4's life will be egg, milk and nut free, her risk of exposure is high. i do everything i can to educate those looking after her, and to try and make them take the milk and egg parts of her allergies more seriously than her nut allergy. there is a comman misconception amongst people who dont know much about allergies that nut ones are the 'worst'. they arent. anything that can cause an anaphylatic child to have a reaction is the 'worst' for them, regardless of whether that is nuts, milk, eggs or citrus fruit, vegetables etc.

ds has never had an allergic reaction at school either unlike the girl at the dumbass nut free table

As I said, that's one unusual example, there's no precedent there for making a rule. I can think of far more cases where a nut ban at dd's school has prevented allergies from happening. In fact dd has NEVER had an allergic reaction at school which is a huge comfort to me.

Dingle you are repeating the myth that there is something special about nut allergy, therefore contributing to a sense that only nut allergies need to be taken seriously. DS is more allergic to seseme seeds and tree nuts than he ever was against peanuts. Why ban peanuts and not seseme, that just doesn't make sense, then ban milk, fruit, potatoes and tomatoes, shellfish, avocado, chickpeas, celery,egg all of which can be highly allergic. It doesn't leave much for anyone else to eat.

Are anaphylactic reactions to nuts more common than to milk, eggs, or other allergens?

I do find it strange that so many people agree with nut bans, but find banning dairy - something that is much harder to avoid so more dangerous - impossible. Why are some allergies more important than others?

But if it is impossible to ban milk does that mean that we have to not ban anything else either, misdee?

The school did not have a nut ban but the child sits at a separate table with only 2 other children .This table is nut and egg free, except it isn't.

The sort of anxiety these kids are in over how ill they can get doesn't fit with the idea of complacency. For my dd, the reassurance that her school lunches are nut free is a lifeline. And she never trusts what her peers bring to eat even with a nut ban.

just because peanut anaphylatics is apaprently more comman does not give it status above other form of anaphylatics.

I just find that a strange argument against banning nuts in school. One family made a mistake in a school without a nut ban so that's a sign that all children would become complacent and not read labels? If that's the worry then the school could spend more time encouraging allergic children to read labels although in my experience with dd and the children in the anaphylactic group she belongs to, they are very diligent, in fact the tendency is to be over-cautious and avoid eating at all. I've been through months when all dd would eat was food cooked at home with me. She wouldn't eat out at all and she wouldn't eat anything anybody else had made. She's been like that since she was younger than four.

Repeating in bold is quoting what other posters have said , it is common MN practise.
It is not a bogus arguement, it is a common sense arguement. The child was lulled into a false sense of security because she was told that she would be provided with a nut free snack so didn't bother to check. If she had not been told that she would have most likely have checked, which is exactly what AC are saying.

But none of those things mean that peanuts should not be banned. You said that happened in a school without a nut ban.

misdee I feel very sorry for you with that. My daughter's friend has nut, milk and wheat allergies and has a very difficult time with it. I think milk is a much harder food to replace than nuts, however, and I don't see that a school could ban it. I don't think that's a reason for not banning nuts though. My daughter is also allergic to sesame and some other seeds but I wouldn't suggest the school bans those. Nuts are easy to ban and anaphylactic reactions to them amongst the most common.

she and her friends were only 4/5. She couldn't read. The parent of the other child made a mistake. Even though she knew it was a big deal because her dd was one of only 2 dcs who would sit with the allergic child she still messed up. Imagine how careless/complacent parents of children who don't know the allergic child will be.

my daughter could die from milk. its not banned in schools.

I just don't buy it. If a child can die from an allergy to something, the danger should be avoided in a school situation. And it is not the same as any other environment a child might find themselves in. There is a far greater ratio of child to adult than you would be likely to get anywhere else in your everyday life elsewhere. It is hard to get noticed if you're feeling ill, it is potentially very dangerous at school for a nut allergic child even if there is a nut ban. Why make it worse? Bogus argument on behalf of the anaphylactic society if you ask me. I've never met a nut allergic child with a false sense of security before. That story about the girl eating the pretzel just shows that a) neither she nor her friends bothered to take her nut allergy seriously and b) her parents had not drilled into her enough about reading labels. I wouldn't say that is the norm.

bruffin, I don't see why you're repeating what you're saying in bold. I'm not disagreeing that a child at school needs to not share food with another child. They need to not share food with another child regardless of whether the school has a no nut possibility or not. But children make mistakes and a school with a no nut possibility is protecting a child more than one that doesn't. Simple fact. I don't think the feeling of responsibility a child feels towards their food ever goes away if they have a severe allergy and I certainly don't think it's made worse by a school having a no nut policy. In any case, the example you're giving was at a school without a no nut policy so I really don't get your point.

If you manage you allergy in "real" life when there are no nut bans then you can manage it at school. There is no such thing as a safe place whether nuts have been banned or not. What about the other children who have life threatening allegies to products other than nuts, are we going to ban those as well?

From the anaphylaxis campaign website

Nut bans

"Some schools choose to enforce ?nut bans?, where it is forbidden for any pupil to bring the problem food to school. However, without wishing to undermine the good intentions of any school taking this approach, The Anaphylaxis Campaign believes there are several pitfalls in this approach. It would be impossible to provide an absolute nut-free guarantee so the danger is that allergic children may be led into a false sense of security. There is a strong case for arguing that food-allergic children will gain a better awareness of their allergies, and learn avoidance strategies, if they move in an environment where allergens may turn up unexpectedly."

At one secondary school pupils threw nuts at a girl with nut allergy to see how she reacted - swollen face, adrenaline, trip to hospital. Of course those with nut allergy are never safe at school, or anywhere else, but it is possible to reduce the risk.

If they are going to do this type of thing anyway I very much doubt they will take any notice of a nut ban are they!

How would parents feel if I took into school a loaded gun and left it lying around for a child to pick up, or passed it to them deliberately. Or if I smeared rat poison over the lunch table and said it's up to you to make your child washes their hands and anyway a small amount won't kill them.

I've watched my child have an allergic reaction and I'd do anything to avoid the risk. I can not understand the attitude that I will potentially kill a child (let's not forget adrenaline doesn't always reverse a reaction) or severely distress them for my child's selfish convenience. No-one needs to eat nuts.

For those who need the information - about half of those with peanut allergy develop tree nut allergy, I don't know if the figure is higher in those who have anaphylactic reactions.

At one secondary school pupils threw nuts at a girl with nut allergy to see how she reacted - swollen face, adrenaline, trip to hospital. Of course those with nut allergy are never safe at school, or anywhere else, but it is possible to reduce the risk.

I agree exactly. I don't understand the attitude that says we can't make it foolproof so let's not bother doing anything at all.

because this happens

I've seen it happen with the aforementioned pretzels, except this wasn't a school with a nut ban, it was a school where a nut allergic child sat on a table with 2 friends whose parents had agreed to send both peanut and egg free food. One of the 2 girls took peanut covered pretzels in, allergic child only had a rash and swelling around one eye because she didn't eat it but she shouldn't have even touched it

You need to treat every situation as though there may be nuts, and not get a false sense of security.

I agree exactly. I don't understand the attitude that says we can't make it foolproof so let's not bother doing anything at all.

It's not like peanuts are a staple....like bread or milk....so the school should of course ban them.

The nut ban lessens the risk of a severe allergic reaction and lessening the risk is, for me, better than nothing.

'if one of her peers eats a peanut butter sandwich then shares a pen with her and my daughter then puts her fingers near her mouth she could die'.

Presumably this could also happen if said child has had crunchy nut cornflakes or nutella, or peanut butter on toast for breakfast. How far do you want to go in banning these products from households? The problem is that although you can ban nuts, you can't 100% guarantee that everything is nut free, all the time.

I am sympathetic, but it seems to me that there is at secondary at least, no practicable way to police this.

There isn't much difference between Y6 and Y7; but there is between Reception and Y7. A nut ban at primary school gets rid of a lot of the risk, but the child and their teachers still have to learn be careful, as other parents can forget / overlook the ban, and foods can contain traces of nuts.

By secondary school, the child should have learnt to be careful about what they come into contact with (not just at school), and not having a nut ban allows them to manage their allergy as they will have to in the 'big wide world', while still in a supportive environment (first aiders aware of their allergy).

So in answer to OP - yes to nut ban in Primary, no in Secondary.

Of course peanut or any other allergic child should never share another child's food even if it's something they eat themselves at home. My daughter never shares drinks or food with anybody when she's at school. But that's not the point. The point is that if a child eats a peanut butter sandwich and doesn't tell my daughter, holds her hand after lunch, my daughter rubs her lips with her hand, she could die. How is that my daughter's responsibility?