Word: peanut
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Reports in 2005 of a peanut-allergic girl who died from anaphylactic shock after kissing her boyfriend, who had eaten some peanut butter hours beforehand, raised alarms that the slightest exposure could prove fatal. It turned out that the girl also had asthma, a dangerous combination, since the lungs of asthmatics are more prone to swelling and shutting down when aggravated. Contact - in kissing, for example - through mucous membranes can also heighten the chances of an attack. For the most part, touching a food allergen is not a problem unless you then rub your eyes or stick your fingers into...
Still, very few people with a peanut allergy die from it. In fact, a 2003 study led by Dr. Scott Sicherer, a Mount Sinai pediatrician, showed that 90% of peanut-allergic children who got peanut butter on their skin developed nothing more than a red rash; none developed a systemic reaction in which their airways swelled up. The same went for smelling peanuts. Thirty peanut-allergic children were asked to sniff peanut butter and a placebo paste for 10 minutes each, and none developed a reaction to the peanut butter. Only one child had difficulty breathing - and that was after...
Such studies are starting to suggest a more nuanced way of handling the peanut problem in schools and other places. "You are probably better off teaching the faculty how to manage food allergies than making the classroom or school a peanut-free zone," says Dr. Sean McGhee, a pediatrician at Mattel Children's Hospital at UCLA. "To my knowledge, there aren't any studies where peanut-free zones decrease the incidence of anaphylaxis...
...some instances, peanut-free zones seem downright silly. Upon request, Delta and Northwest airlines will set up a peanut-free buffer zone spanning three rows in front of and behind an allergic passenger. (Why three rows instead of four or five?) Foodmakers have also gone a little overboard. In 2006 a federal law started requiring companies to use plain language to note the presence in their products of any of eight major allergens: milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat and soybeans. But concern about liability claims led manufacturers to voluntarily supplement these labels with alerts on products...
...find yourself having to take a chance," says Noah, who continues to eat his favorite brand of pretzels even though it now carries the warning "Produced in a facility that handles peanut butter." And he's not alone. A study by Sicherer in 2007 found that 75% of food-allergic people ignored these labels when shopping, unsure exactly how great the danger of cross-contamination was. The same study also found that 1 in 10 products tested actually contained the allergen noted in the warning on the packaging...