or have the school gone bonkers?

[ohballs2013]

got a letter last night, in the new teacher info pack.
the school have said that as of the new school term a few more items have been added to the not allowed in lunch box list.
we already had the normal,
no nuts
no fizzy drinks
no bars of chocolate

now we also have

no bananas
no berry fruit, including anything containing berry fruit, such as smoothies, youghurts, cereal bars etc
no fish
no eggs
no crisps
no citrus fruits
no peices of meat, ie chicken legs.

now i get that you have to protect as many kids with allergies as possible..but WTF. is it not going a bit mad?
my own child has coeliacs, so i know all about limited diets, but im astonished at this.

Oh blimey...you're totally right about ascorbic acid. I am a plank.

Still...citric acid is in everything.

That list is bonkers. Even if there are children allergic to all those, many of them are unlikely to cause anaphylactic reactions from someone else eating them nearby.

By going OTT, parents are more likely to ignore the whole list IMHO. Increasing the risk.

FWIW my school only asks that we send no sweets and no fizzy drinks.

Yanbu

I don't think foods should be banned because of allergies except in extremely severe cases or with children too little to know and who my accidentally eat something they're allergic too

A mild allergy should just stop that child having something, and maybe on any occasions where you're providing food for the class it should be considered, but for your child's packed lunch why does it matter if little flossie feels a bit sick if she eats a dozen eggs?

ridiculous and I say that as an ex healthy schools person. If a child has allergies that severe that all these items are life threatening just being in the school then it may be that homeschooling would be a safer option. Its unfeasible to expect the whole schools lunches to adhere to such a control for one child. one or two items... fair enough but all that?

MidniteScribbler The approach taken by your school seems the most sensible I have come across, because it is the needs of the individual child being addressed. I am impressed. DS's school has banned nuts, but do seem to have some weird ideas about food.

head called me.
2 new kids have a variety of allergies, as yet they havent been diagnosed with what exactly sets off their reactions, so the parents have asked for all the potential causes to be banned.
apparently school dinners wont be changing cause the parents wont be giving their kids school dinners, so the rest of the school children wont be too disrupted....
i pointed out that my dc cant have school dinners, so what exaclty should i send.
i asked how they would be making sure there was no cross contamination when the kids all sit in the same room to eat. apparently they hadnt thought about that...

The head sounds clueless. They have to carry their trays Ffs. There's far more opportunity for spillage and cross contamination with school meals than there is from a kid sat down with a lunch box. Madness

That's a bit packed lunch-ist.

So the parents have requested it? Not sure where that leaves everyone really.

If they don't know what it is but they want all potentials banned, then surely ALL food would have to be banned?
School is pandering to hysterical parents. I understand the panic when you have allergic children, I've been there, but indulging that panic doesn't help anyone, least of all the kids involved.

I think the parents need to make it a priority to get a clear diagnosis and the head needs to get thinking quick.

Do what SDTG said. No way can they police that amount of banned foods. And the parents should not be pandered to in that way.

they should not be banning anything without a clear diagnosis.

school sound like they have Not Thought It Through.

!!!!!

I can't believe that they have simply acceded to a parent's wish to ban all "potential" allergens like that! Not to mention the doublespeak on the school lunches. I'd be tempted to reply that as with school lunches the affected child won't be eating my child's lunch.

There must be guidelines from the Education Authority or some higher up body for this sort of situation?

So they ban all those things just in case, ridiculous! Guess you should count yourself lucky that dairy and wheat aren't potential causes.

School have not thought this through and over reacted big time.

Sounds absolutely crazy!

Write to the school and say that since most of the things that your DC can eat are now banned, you would like the school to provide a meal for him and then list all of the things that your DC cannot eat.

Demand a menu tailored to his needs too.

I think the head needs to think about this clearly!

That's just silly.

You need a next step OP - I suggest a letter to the governors asking them how they're going to implement a protocol that works for everyone, and including regard for your own dc's coeliac - ie when one food is out of bounds it's even more important to have variety in the foods which can be eaten.

Madness!

Go back and make the head see how untenable this is.

But it doesn't even make sense! If school dinners are ok then surely all packed lunches are ok if the reasoning is that the children aren't eating those meals.

Sorry, I'm arriving a bit late to this although I have read it all. I'm very lucky in that although I have a variety of allergies (non anaphylactic) my children so far, appear to have have no food allergies. Our school also has a nut ban but that's as far as it goes. I really think that in this case a ban on so many items in lunch boxes but not in school dinners makes absolutely no sense to me! I'm also wondering if the parents' requests are backed up medically? Surely in order to make such a wide-reaching request, you would have to have some sort of doctors confirmation? And if the allergies are so severe as to require such an extensive ban then school dinners would also have to comply. It all seems a bit knee jerk and not thought through to me

Oh dear. This is ridiculous. You can't ban all potential allergens from packed lunches while still allowing all of those things to be present in the same room from school dinners. Why on earth can't they get proper testing? Surely, if the mere presence of some of these things is enough to set off a reaction, it would be trivial to identify which one(s)? If it really is all of them, there has got to be a better solution than this.

Sounds looking like the head is clueless. Complain again. Raise it with governors, get other parents to do the same.
I have a lot of sympathy for people living with allergies but seriously, expecting 200 or so children to restrict their diets like this is ridiculous and pointless.
If the allergy is so severe then surely homeschooling is the only option?