why are fortified cereals labelled not suitable for milk allergy?

[Betty5313]

Dd is severely milk protein intolerance and her symptoms are worsening. just j noticed on her instant oat cereal it says not suitable for milk allergy but the ingredients are just oats and the usual vitamins and minerals.

Because they cannot guarantee that no milk in there.

Why not switch to proper porridge?

The reason for the fortified cereal is that it is one of her biggest sources of calcium.

Can you use fortified milks instead? We use oatly and kara calcium enriched milks for our dairy intolerant DCs.

I also give the DC almond butter for calcium and hummus. Plus make milk puddings with kara milk.

I think if you look at the ingredients, some of them contain skimmed mild powder.

It's a judgement call whether to avoid 'may contain' / 'not suitable for because of manufacturing methods' labels. It actually means very little, as it's not a legally protected statement. It often indicates that products with milk have been produced on the same line, so tiny bits of milk may accidentally find their way into it, despite cleaning. Some foods are notoriously more difficult to clean and therefore more risky in terms of cross contamination (chocolate). If the food contains any milk products (eg skimmed milk) this must be listed in the ingredients by law. Each family has to find their own 'rules' about how to approach 'may contain' labels. There have been a couple of threads discussing it here which may help if you track them down. The anaphylaxis campaign Aldo has good information on its website to help you decide.

I agree with Maz007. There is no legal requirement to use 'may contain' etc on food labels so just because a product doesn't carry a warning doesn't necessarily mean it's any more or less likely to be 'contaminated'. This is why it's such a minefield for anyone living with allergies. We choose to give DS Morrisons instant hot oat cereal even though it says 'may contain milk' and he's never had a reaction but that's a personal choice and not something I'd recommend to anyone else. I was very worried about his calcium intake so decided to try it as it has added calcium and vits. This is an area the Anaphylaxis Campaign are looking into as they want food labelling to be uniform and more useful for anyone with allergies.

thanks everyone, I was just curious. Dd is mostly ok but still reacting to un unknown things. She has oatly enriched milk but only avoids needing calcium supplement by having the enriched cereal as well. so I am really hoping that the cereal isn't something we need to drop. she is highly sensitive to chickpeas so cant have hummus and we think sesame is also an issue which rules out tahini.