free fruit in schools. but no nuts allowed

[stitch]

another rant i'm afraid.

dc school has decided that they dont think the chidlren get enough veg and fruit, so will be providing evry child with a free piece of fruit. the school is a state school, in an affluent area, so full of poncy wannabe, organice lentil weaving moms, who frown on jam sandwiches and fruit as being not healthy enough for their lo's. needless to say that ballet lessons and gym memberships are almost derigeur.

but the same school declares itself a nut free zone. yet nuts are an extremely healthy snack. they are full of essential oils. minerals, etc. tiny packets of energy, they will be far better at keeping the kids going, than half an apple, or whatever.almonds are chock full of calcium, essential not only for good bone developement, but boossts immune systems wonderfully. etc etc etc.
the kids come out of class at least twice a week clutching crappy sweets full of artificial flavourings andcolourings becuaes it is someones birthday. a practice theschool positively encourages. and of course, the siblings also get given the artifical crap by the birthday childs mother.
surely a bar of chocolate would be healthier than the crappy chewy maom they come out with?

[VeniVidiVickiQV]

Yes cat - I'd like to point out though that cows milk allergies can be severe and life-threatening, but only through accidental ingestion, rather than close contact. My DD used to develop hives when kissed by someone who'd had something with cows milk in up to 4 or 5 hours previously. But, it's still not as serious a reaction as nut allergies can cause by being close. Thankfully, DD has largely grown up of her cows milk allergy and just has the peanut allergy to contend with. She has other minor allergies which are kept largely under control by daily anti-histhamine doses.

[VeniVidiVickiQV]

IF - Western Europeans and Americans have developed an immunity of sorts to cows milk protein even though lactase production slows in childhood. Asians and Africans are far more likely to be 'intolerant' to cows milk than Europeans because it is not in their diet as much.

[Ali4cotswolds]

Maybe the school has a generalised policy so as not to single a child out ...ie because we now have 'child A' at school with a nut allergy - nuts are now banned!

[filz]

not this again

ds1s school is nut free and also provides free fruit at snack time

there is no problem and i dont understand yours

I was never allowed nuts until i was 12 anyway, its not compulsiry and surely they can have nuts at home?

[ADragonIs4LifeNotJustHalloween]

I think you may be wrong baout the dairy one. I think a MNer on another thread like this only a week or so ago said that her child had a severe dairy allergy. I think the severe nut ones are more common though (as in they more commonly result in a severe reaction)

[bundle]

I didn't say severe dairy reactions didn't happen, I said the figs weren't as big as with nut allergy

[takle]

Haven't had time to read the whole thread, so sorry if I repeat, but the problem I see with a blanket ban is that a) it is impossible to achieve and b) what about other allergies.

If a child has a very severe reaction to nuts, then it stands to reason that they are also likely to react to nut ingredients too. So how does the school check to see whether there are any nut ingredients in the children's lunches? Do they check the ingredients list of every product for every child with a packed lunch in the whole school? I suspect not. Yet, by having a blanket ban the child with the allergy may be lulled into a false sense of security that there are no nuts and so not notice the nuts in the cake, or on the bar or in the biscuit of their friend's lunch that they just choose to take a bite out of. Unless you can guarantee that every product that every child brings into school is nut free, then I think the school is just making a false promise and are just lulling the child and parents into a false sense of security of something that they cannot actually guarantee is nut free.

My second concern is that there are other serious reactions to other foods too. I know of two people with egg allergies. One has it so severe that if she eats egg, her throat swells up and she cannot breathe. This is (I guess) potentially life threatening, or very serious to say the least... so again are we going to ban all eggs and egg related products? That means no cakes for any children, no pastries or anything else that may be glazed over with egg, no quiches or other foods that may contain eggs and so on... Then there are the dairy free children... and the gluten free....

So if we really did ban all foods that could potentially harm other children we would have to ban .... nuts, biscuits, cakes, eggs, bread and bread products, yoghurts, milk, cheese ... so actually what are we to feed our children?

Or are we going to discriminate against children of the other allergies and say that their allergies aren't as important even though some allergies, such as egg can be just as dangerous? Or are we going to tell the mums of some children that their child's allergy doesn't matter as much? - We practically can't make schools genuinely allergy free zones, let alone just egg and nut free zones. I think we need to find a better way to deal with this problem. A simple ban I think is a naive and knee jerk reaction that is completely impractical and makes guarantees that are actually guarantees against nothing in reality.

[imaginaryfriend]

I don't mean to sound rude takle but everything you've mentioned has been bandied back and forth already in the thread. Have a read through as you'll probably find opinions in both directions which relate to your questions / suggestions.