difference between 'may contain' and 'not suitable'??

[mrsmoores]

Quick background..

ds allergic to many things including all dairy. He had a baked egg challenge last week, he managed to eat 1/4 of a victoria sponge with no problems and I was told to give him baked egg in his diet at least twice a week.

Anyway.. a friend gave him a sainsburys jaffa cake and 3 mins after he said his lips hurt and his mouth felt funny, he also became quite aggitated. I gave him piriton and he was fine.

So back to my original question .. on the back of the packet it did say not suitable for milk allergy sufferers. I don't avoid things that say 'may contain milk' so assumed 'not suitable' would be the same.

What exactly is the difference?? I'm hoping it is the milk that could have been the problem and not the egg.

Sorry for the long post!

I think 'may contain' is when due to manufacturing methods allergens from another product may have come into contact with it where 'not suitable' says it definitely does contain that allergen. Most of the supermarkets produce information on all their own label products with regards to allergens.

If you contact their free phone number for customer services they should be able to provide you with a list.

Not suitable means not suitable!

I would say it is more definitive than "may contain". By this token I would not give my DD items with "not suitable", though have gambled with "may contain", usually depending on what other information is on the label.

It is a minefield though, and I really wish there was a legal standard.

Just googled Sainsbury's Jaffa cakes and it says they are not suitable due to the manufacturing process. I Would imagine it was pretty likely that it was Dairy then?

And why, by the way is it not a legal requirement to put allergen warnings on cosmetics?!

I am not sure, m an s show a list of allergens that the item contains and then they say not suitable for nut allergy sufferers as well

Agree with Lozza - 'may contain' means cross-contamination is pretty unlikely but technically possible, because the allergen is used somewhere in the factory, or even simply because they don't want to get sued for ANY allergic reactions. That's how you get the 'may contain nuts' warnings on bottles of water.

I rang Asda about this fairly recently and they were really helpful. (DS had reacted to one of their own-brand foods)

They person I spoke to didn't know straight away but rang me back the next day and said this product (which DS had been having for ages with no problems) was now being produced on a different machine - one which was also used for products containing dairy - so the risk of contamination with milk was now very high. (They had put 'not suitable for milk allergy sufferers' on the new packets in very tiny letters but I hadn't noticed).

I avoid 'not suitable' and 'produced on a line handling...'

Thanks for the info, you would think that after 3 years of dealing with this I wouldn't have to ask!

I have come across warnings that say made on a line that handles milk etc. and I always stay clear of those products.

It was the definition between the two I was interested in so I am not crapping myself the next time I am brave enough to feed my ds more baked egg goodies. (and I'll be making them myself next time)

hmm i always used to think that food that 'may contain' dairy was OK for my 3yo DD until this morning when I tried her on a tesco own brand jaffa cake (which I read on here was dairy free!).

the label did say that 'the dark chocolate in this product may contain milk' and lo and behold within a few minutes she had half a dozen hives around her mouth :(

I guess her allergy is probably getting worse not better as I wasn't expecting her to react. So we'd best keep clear of all 'main contain' foods as well from now on!

I think with all the rationalisation and cost cutting going on at the moment we will all need to re-check products that we had previously thought to be 'free from'. All it takes is a cheaper ingredient/ change of manufacturer/ change of production line to make a difference. They are hardly likely to put 'new improved' on the packaging (cost implications) when all they have done is change production line. It's a jungle out there!

'Not suitable for' is definitely a no-no. Generally we tend to avoid 'May contain', I used to think the risk was minimal but after some suspected reactions I started to contact companies - it turned out that wasn't the case and they used the same line.
The other labelling which is a bit ambiguous is 'produced in a factory handling'. M&S have recently changed theirs to say 'Not suitable' where they previously had this, though with other companies they are in a different part of the factory and so very small chance of cross contamination.