Since she was diagnosed as a toddler, DD (12) ha suffered from serious food allergies. If she consumes even a tiny fragment of a peanut she will go into anaphylactic shock and must carry an epipen at all times. She is also allergic to other nuts, eggs, and orchard fruits. Every time she attends a birthday party, play date, school trip I have to brief the supervising parent and also when she was little I had to watch her vigilantly. It has been stressful and terrifying, especially now that she is getting older and more independent although she is extremely sensible and cautious. However, so many lives have been saved thanks to the tireless activism of other parents whose children have died tragically, and specifically because of Natasha’s Law (after the death of Natasha Ednan-Laperouse when her parents campaigned to change the law to demand increased transparency in the listing of ingredients for packaged food).
So it boils my blood to read in The Times today, Giles Coren’s column about how “baffled” he is that parents who’ve lost a child campaign against the “terrible 10,000 to 1 piece of bad luck that killed them.” As an allergies parent, unlike the contemptible Mr Coren, I have the utmost respect for grieving parents who lose a child to a preventable death and then try to save others from the same tragic fate.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/caitlyn-scott-lees-father-can-teach-us-all-how-to-handle-grief-jdhdspxbd