Nuts.

[goodbeans]

DS had this message in his nursery diary: 'Please can you avoid pesto because of nut allergies within the nursery'.

This was in reference to him having been sent in with pasta and green pesto (DH on lunch duties, he forgot the rule). I did find it annoying though, as pesto is made with pine nuts, which are seeds and not nuts, despite the misleading name. (I know that some red pesto is made with cashews, and so I would never use that in food intended for nursery, although I suspect that most staff wouldn't question it as it could easily be mistaken for a regular tomato sauce...)

Anyway, I would like to send a note to the following effect back: 'We always avoid sending any food into nursery that contains nuts. However, pine nuts are seeds (despite the misleading name!) If there is a child with a seed allergy at nursery then we will of course be careful to avoid sending any seed containing foods in DS's lunch.'

AIBU to reply like this to nursery? Or is this weird kind of blanket ban (based on a misnomer) normal?! If it is then I will just suck it up, but it is frustrating given that it doesn't seem to have much basis in common sense.

Children can anaphylaxis to milk and they dont ban milk.
Nessie
You are not the only parent in the world whose child has nut allergy. Both ds 21 and dh have nut allergy, ds has also seeds. Some of us have been dealing with it for a very long time. You have no need to he so rude to omg. If your school has banned nuts they have taken the lazy way out

Omgnotagain do you know why you're completely missing the point? You're missing the point because the people insisting on the nut ban aren't the parents of allergic children (who you seem to think want it so they don't have to bother educating their children); the people insisting on the nut ban are the nursery.

The nursery have made assurances to the parents of allergic children that they will keep them out of harms way, and that means keeping them away from allergens. Perhaps there's another way to do that; perhaps they could feed the allergic child in a separate room. Then they could bathe all the other children to remove traces of the lunch from their hands and faces, then they could clean anything those children could have come into contact with over lunch, then they could clean themselves up too just to be sure, because can you imagine how much trouble there would be if they missed a spot? Not to mention legal liability....

Could they do that? Maybe. But instead they choose to put in place a nut ban so everyone can just get on with nursery life as usual, and every employed there can get on with their jobs of looking after our children. Parents who don't want to abide by that nursery rule need not send their children there. It has nothing to do with parents failing to prepare their children for the big wide world.

You're creating a false equivalence to make yourself seem less ridiculous.

Think they failed there

Omg you are completely missing the point, we are talking about very young children who need to learn to avoid a common food that can kill them. Most kind people wouldn't mind a nut ban in nursery and primary school while these young children get a chance to learn and would thank their lucky stars that their loved ones didn't have such an allergy. Even with a nut ban these children are learning they need to be careful, one of ds's school friends was blue lighted out of school at least twice after contact with nuts in a school with a nut ban.

I am allergic to penicillin and it is so easy to avoid, unlike a common food like nuts.

DS is 3.10 and can self police his allergies to a certain extent. He knows what cashew nuts/peanut m&ms/tunnocks teacakes/scrambled eggs etc look like and that he can't eat them. He wouldn't have a clue about pesto though!

OMG I too have allergy to penicillan & coeliac disease in my family.

You dont put penicillan easily obtainable in a school nursery & coeliacs do not potentially immediately die upon exposure to gluten - your arguement is baseless, without foundation, and (in my lowly opinion) bloody rude!!!

You are entitled to your opinion, & I am entitled to mine. But as a matter of courtesy you should perhaps keep in mind that the parents / caregivers of children with food allergies usually do not expect anyone to 'bend' to us, we get on with things as best we can, teach our children to take care as best we can, and hope that no adult is teaching their child not to show a little consideration of others - whether it be an allergy, a disability, race, colour, creed or any other myriad of things that make people 'different'.

Acceptance of people's differences is what makes us good human beings.

Ignorance is a learned behaviour!

bruffin, while I dont want to be rude, people choosing to blame caregivers for nut bans get my blood boiling.

My son has more food allergies than nuts, including ones that are not easily policed. The school made a choice, their choice.

Other than that I take the responsibilty with his food, along with his father & any other adult he is in the care of, and we dont expect the world to revolve around it.

But outlandish sweeping statements from people who could very easily just make a little effort to adhere to school rules bugs me.

Do people not follow rules in work, school, the law etc etc, or is that too much hard work too??

I have considerable experience of this. In my work life, I am a solicitor whose job involves advising nurseries on the legal issues relating to severe allergies - the most common being nut, milk and egg.

At home, I have a DS who has a severe allergy to walnuts, pecans and hazelnuts; we carry a Jext pen everywhere.

DS was diagnosed at hospital after suffering an anaphylactic reaction when the only thing which could have caused it was pesto. The recipe contained none of the nuts to which it turned out he is allergic; the label stated that it contained only pine nuts, to which my son is not allergic.

The consultant and dietician at the hospital explained that it is common for pesto to be cross-contaminated, as the production lines are often used consecutively for preparing different products. It is likely that my son ate pesto made on a line which had previously chopped walnuts.

As an aside, some people are very allergic to pine nuts; allergy to one type of nut can apparently predispose a child to develop an allergy to other types.

So, in a nutshell, I think YABU, although I accept that at first blush the nursery might seem to be overly cautious.

Have just read more of the thread. There is a particular problem with nuts and seeds at this age because:

• very young children are less able consistently to remember not to share food, and to wash hands after handling food to which others may be vary allergic; older children learn to be more vigilant;
• peanut allergy is very common (and often severe) and peanut is considered in allergy terms to be a "dirty" nut. This means that other nut and seed products are easily contaminated by peanuts during storage and processing. That is why many nurseries ban a wide spectrum of nut and seed products.

OMG. The ban is in place to ensure all children are safe and able to touch door handles and play equipment without fear of death.

Are you able to grasp that concept? DEATH

Bruffin, some of my nursery owning clients will not offer a place at nursery to babies who have a very severe milk allergy, because they cannot guarantee a sufficient level of safety. It is nigh on impossible to guarantee a baby or toddler will not have some contact with milk in a nursery setting, however careful the staff are.

Even if a child can be kept away from dairy products whilst the children are being fed, it is never possible to guarantee that milk will not be spilled or suddenly vomited and that the allergic child will not have some contact with it - which can be enough to trigger a reaction.

Some nurseries will blithely say, "We have staff trained to use Epipens", but that might not be a complete safeguard. On occasion, the drugs just don't work adequately. Some very young children are allergic to the drugs themselves. An anaphylactic reaction is very dangerous and distressing even if the medication is at hand, and often, a severe allergy will get increasingly worse after each episode of anaphylactic shock.

Fozzleyplum
My son has had anaphylatic reaction,i dont need a lecture on it. Secondly a severe allergy does not necessarily get worse,that is myth.

Bruffin, I didn't say it necessarily will - if you read my post, I said it often will - which is medically correct.

Bruffin, fozzley said 'often', not always.

I for 1 would not voluntarily subject any person to go through one to test the theory. Would you?

My son is under an allergist in a children's hospital & has advised the same, im not going to argue with medical opinion in this instance.

Regardless of all this, the OP was BU, and hopefully now wont be.

I said to name a few; there are several more that I haven't mentioned including a very severe allergy to dairy, but again, I don't need to justify my opinion to you.

If all you can do is resort to insults because someone doesn't agree with you, I'll bow out now and won't post again because bun fights aren't my thing.

Well I google it and got this result:

"Pine nut allergies are similar to other tree nut allergies, and can cause mild, moderate, and severe allergic responses including anaphylaxis. Cross-reactivity has been reported between pine nuts and peanuts and between pine nuts and pine pollen."

acaai.org/allergies/types/allergy-myths/pine-tree-allergy

Plus, pine nuts are pretty expensive so often pesto's are "bulked up" with other nuts like cashews, walnuts etc...

Actually pine nuts are also tested as part of the nut allergy as well as peanuts (which are legumes). My son has a nut allergy and has been tested on everything.

Op Lots of nuts, seeds and legumes share the same allergenic protein. It's called cross-reactivity.

My DD is allergic to protein/component which cross reacts in peanut (legume), pine nut (seed), Brazil nut (nut), coconut (drupe) and almond (drupe). She isn't allergic to all seeds, nuts and legumes; she has life-threatening allergy to that specific component.

Besides, as a biologist, you should know that many "nuts" (pecans, pistachios, almonds, walnuts, Brazil nuts) are not nuts in a botanical sense. Unfortunately my DD's immune system doesn't give a shiny shit about botany.

You might be a biologist but not an allergist.
Live and let live.

Peanuts are actually seeds, not nuts.

Almost all pesto have cashew nuts in it, which are as much of an allergen if not more so than peanuts for many nut allergy sufferers. Read your ingredient list - its not just pine nuts I bet you. Well done on the school for picking up on it.

Food unwrapped did an item on Pesto recently. I think it's on 4 demand still if anybody is interested (the basil farm episode). From memory they were querying how pesto was so cheap when pine nuts are expensive. The answer was - they use nuts to pad it out.

Fair enough you didn't know op. But staff have no way of knowing which pesto you've bought. I'd just avoid it so that they don't have to worry. It's a small thing we can do to keep all the dc safe.

YANBU

Air allergy to nuts is a myth

Air allergies are NOT a myth, I'll just clear that up with you right now.
Don't come out with stuff like that on a public forum if you have no idea what you're talking about, it's dangerous as stating it as fact could cause someone else to be blasé around people with allergies.
I myself have an allergy to eggs, and I don't even have to eat them or even touch them.
Me merely walking into a room where you were cooking yourself a fried egg would be enough to make my eyes swell up and weld themselves shut.
It's not a huge leap of the imagination to think that could easily happen to someone's throat if their allergy was severe enough.

Haven't Rtft and not a biologist, but my brother is slightly allergic to almonds and a cousin to pine nuts. No issues with seeded bread etc. It is common to be more sensitive to 'not really nuts' nuts than other seeds. Are you being driven by an overwhelming desire to be right? These are children. Feed your child pesto and peanut butter at home.

Ready made pesto is often made with cashews. My son has anaphylaxis to cashews and would react. He had a reaction on a flight with a chicken pesto kids meal before we knew about the allergies. If it's home made with pine nuts it should be fine but I guess they made the rule general to make it easier. Some children also allergic to pine nuts though. I know it's a pain when you're restricted but an anaphylaxis is life threatening and it's scary on the other side thinking of my son!