<p>Who serves the food? Is it done by staff, and do the staff members make sure that the serving implement for one food does not come in contact with a second food already on the plate?</p>
<p>Or is it done sloppily, leading to cross-contamination?</p>
<p>Even worse, is the serving done by the students themselves, salad bar style? If this is the arrangement, you had better assume that everything is cross-contaminated with everything else.</p>
<p>I’ve been in the dining halls at the college my daughter attended. For almost all items, students serve themselves. I’ve eaten there, and even though I tried to avoid it, there were times when the serving implement for one food came into contact with another food on my plate. I cannot see how anyone with a serious food allergy could eat there, unless the school makes special arrangements to get the student’s food from the kitchen, before it goes out into the cafeteria.</p>
<p>To add to #119, not all people who are allergic to peanuts are life-threateningly allergic to peanuts. It’s a spectrum, ranging from those who get itchy and take some Benadryl to those who get hives and nothing more, to those who get swollen lips to those who can die. Thus, a lot less than .5 to .6% of the population truly have critical allergy. The odds are important when looking at policy change, eg changing food service culture and infrastructure. On the other hand, that policy change and infrastructure change isn’t necessarily onerous on the rest of the population. That’s the matter over which people might have conflicts. A miniscule chance of having a student death in your dining hall/unneccesary change to policy and environment vs a huge risk to those few individuals.</p>
<p>I have a child with a severe peanut allergy. I think the college policy is overkill. It is very rare for anyone to have an anaphylactic reaction simply by being in the same room with peanuts, unless they’re in a pressurized airplane cabin. Skin contact results only in a rash; you have to actually get the peanuts in your mouth to have a life-threatening reaction in most cases, and if you wash the PB off your skin before, say, sucking on your arm, this is unlikely to happen.</p>
<p>In elementary school, peanuts were not allowed in the classrooms, but kids could have PB in the cafeteria, and there was a separate table for kids with PA. It worked just fine.</p>
<p>DS is a junior in high school now and, as far as I know, sits with kids having PB all the time. </p>
<p>My guess is that this is a helicopter situation or there really is a student who is so sensitive to peanuts that he/she cannot be anywhere near them. I will say that DS doesn’t like to go into certain Whole Foods grocery stores because the peanut smell makes him feel sick. However, he has never had anything more than nausea from simply smelling the peanuts.</p>
<p>The Stanford dining staff served the food and not the students at this particular dining hall. As for food allergies, there is a spectrum of reactions as mentioned earlier. But past benign reactions don’t always lead to future benign reactions. It can go either way. I can say for sure that in the last decade, the attention to food allergies have resulted in better food labeling. Also, I have noticed a rapid increase in the prevalence of food allergies over the past 15 years. In due time, even those who are resistant to the banning peanuts will come around.</p>
<p>While college life is the beginning of the “real world,” residence life is meant to be a “home away from home.” Students with allergies face the “real-world” challenges of eating in restaurants (which college students do plenty), negotiating issues with others in the dormitory (one hopes the roommates/suitemates of allergic students would be kind enough to accommodate the allergic student), and maintaining vigilance at parties and other venues. </p>
<p>This being the case, I think it’s very nice if the dining services can take the trouble to ensure that students with food allergies can let their guard down a LITTLE. It’s not a huge hardship to decide to cook without peanuts and nuts, is it?</p>
<p>I think its prudent to not cook with peanuts or peanut oil, but the question is, not just cooking but not allowing students to have peanuts or any peanut products available at all. A complete ban. Most ingredients listed in baked items state that the food may not have peanuts/nut in them but the facility shares equipment with those products. A “may contain” labelling. I suspect the list of “may contain” food products will grow tremendously as time goes on and food companies try to minimize their liabilities. Thus making this a very complex situation for all involved.
By the time all is said and done, what food will anyone be allowed other than serving raw and whole foods.</p>
<p>Does it make sense for people allergic to peanuts to be treated as though they have a disability? Because it really is something that requires special accommodations. </p>
<p>Here’s an article that discusses the process students should take when seeking accommodations for a disability–maybe some of the same guidelines should apply.</p>
<p>When my D registered with the office of disabilities last spring due to an issue that was keeping her out of class for a couple weeks, they told her she should have been registered all along because of her peanut allergy. We had never thought of that as a disability. She’s never needed special accommodations because she only has a life threatening reaction if she ingests peanut products and gets hives if she touches it. She doesn’t have the airborn reaction, thank goodness. She does avoid restaurants where there are peanuts everywhere- like 5 Guys and some of the chain steakhouses. </p>
<p>I do know someone whose son has had severe reactions from being in the room with peanut products. I don’t even know how they manage it now that he’s older. You can keep a young child pretty isolated, but I don’t know how you live that way as an adult. </p>
<p>I hope the researchers working on this particular allergy manage to release something soon. It is a very difficult allergy to deal with sometimes and it does seem to be increasing in prevalence.</p>
<p>I believe, though I am not sure, that at my D’s college a food allergy requiring accommodation required being listed under Disability Services. She has celiac and thus has “first dibs” at the one dorm complex that offers gluten-free dining. She had to get a letter from her physician certifying this; she handled it, but I believe it was through Disability Services. The same would undoubtedly be true for a peanut allergic student.</p>
<p>If the college has multiple dining halls and a student can eat at any, do you all object to one of them being designated as peanut-free? Or is the objection because this was apparently the only dining hall on the campus? Just trying to understand the level of reaction.</p>
<p>jaylynn, am interested in your statement about some of the psychological effects on the families of those with peanut allergy. I have wondered if RAST testing might lead to over paranoia. Is that still thought to be fairly accurate? </p>
<p>Meanwhile the NY Times magazine had a good article on a cure. Not easy, not widely available. But is something: </p>
<p>I like the analogy to a loaded handgun. My D is disgusted by peanuts and peanut butter, as being in the presence of of peanuts is similar to sitting next to someone with a loaded gun. It’s not killing you now, but there is a heightened awareness of the lethality of what the person next to you is casually holding.</p>
<p>In reading of the girl in Sacramento, I was reminded of something a pediatrician once told me. Many fatalities can be ascribed to not giving epi soon enough. It feels like a big deal-giving a shot. It is fairly benign, though increases the heart rate. But for most kids, is better to give epi a little too soon, rather than not at all, or till breathing becomes compromised. Perhaps that would have saved this girl, but I’d probably have done just what those parents did myself. </p>
<p>Ds one big reaction was in elementary school, trading someone for a brownie that ended up containing peanuts. She was hot, feverish an hour later, went to the nurses’s office, who treated her as if she was coming down with the flu. They called me, when they realized it might be peanuts. When I got there, a few hours post ingestion, I pulled up her shirt, saw full body hives, listened to her lungs, which were a wheezy mess. Epi fixed it for the short term, benedryl for the longer term though we spent a few hours in the pediatricians office making sure she was ok. Some kids would have died.</p>
<p>I like that analogy too. The difference is that with guns, EVERYONE is at risk of being accidentally shot, whereas peanuts only endanger those who are allergic to them.</p>
The reason is above is why their peanut allergy will never not be a big deal in their college life. You can’t stop a college from letting peanuts onto their campus. The threat will always be there.</p>
<p>There wouldn’t be a penalty. It’s not their fault they unknowingly touched a peanut. The thought of expelling a student for doing such a thing is over dramatic and highly improbable.</p>
<p>My view on this is: their peanut allergy is their problem. In a college, as a “community”, they can do things to alleviate some of the risk involved in their allergy. They can offer peanut free alternatives. They can remove the meal plan requirements or offer allergen friendly housing. However, I don’t believe taking away peanuts from an entire community for a small percentage is fair to the majority and they shouldn’t be penalized if they unknowingly and unintentionally caused a reaction for someone.</p>
<p>Once a PA sufferer graduates from college, then what? How can the world ever be made safe enough? </p>
<p>great lakes mom, the Sacramento girl’s story was especially tragic because she seemed fine right after ingesting the peanuts and the parents did not administer the epi pen until after she started showing symptoms. I still don’t understand why the treats were served in the first place if all the kids in this family have the allergy and/or why no one checked each item on the table to ensure it was safe. It is not uncommon for people to make rice krispie treats with peanut butter. :(</p>
<p>Terrible analogy. Cars are visible and people can take steps to be safe in and around them. If the lady in line behind you at Starbuck’s has a loaded handgun in her purse, you have no way of knowing that you are at risk–and there is no precaution you can take to protect yourself.</p>
<p>Personally I have never heard of rice krispie treats to be made with peanut butter and since it is a pretty common allergy, I think it is unusual for a camp to serve something that probably more than one person would be allergic to.
But perhaps my area is just more conscious of allergies?</p>