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I feel for the child with the peanut butter allergy, but I think the general population of students are being discriminated against. When you look at the time it take away from educating the majority of the students, it is certainly not fair. Perhaps, that child needs to have teachers coming to the house. It is sad, however, it is too disruptive to everyone. I also think about the legal ramifications if that child gets sick at school. Accomodations are one thing, but this is way over the edge.
Not just sick - DEAD.
I do agree that these accomodations are over-the-top, and I suspect that they were designed that way to spark outrage.
I'd like to smack whoever came up with them, because they only serve to feed the ignorance out there about this condition.
I don't think anyone's arguing in favor of being mean.
But I think it quite legitimate to honestly wonder how this child will function outside of school. Or how someone who is that allergic to a common food product can manage not to die under normal circumstances.
The nut allergy people have failed to acknowledge a truth: nuts are a reasonable thing to eat. Nuts are not junk food. Nuts are cheap and nutritious. Nuts are a very useful part of a well rounded diet and have been so for centuries. People are not consuming them out of a desire to be jerks.
Banning an inexpensive food product that is easily grown and has many benefits for much of the population does seem a bit extreme. Especially when we're doing to benefit a very small handful of people who frankly have not really demonstrated that there aren't better ways to cope with their problem.
I just don't think the whole "you big rotten meanie you want me to die so you can stuff your fat face" attitude is very helpful.
If someone has allergies, it is up to them to manage their problem and not inflict their misery on others. My sister is allergic to citric acid, but that never stopped our household from drinking orange juice or eating pizza or spaghetti. Before my sister was old enough to understand the consequences of eating or drinking foods that would cause her allergic reaction, my mother made certain what she ate or drank was safe. Later, as my sister became more educated on her condition, she would manage what she ate and drank herself. If we were having orange juice with breakfast, she would have a glass of milk.
If a family can have a child with severe allergies and still not ban food products or deprive other family members, then schools can do the same thing without impinging upon other children.
The child with the allergy needs to learn that the world is filled with hazards, and they need to learn how to cope with those hazards. Coddling them, or even worse depriving everyone else what might be construed harmful to the child, will only cause that child severe problems in the future because that is not how the real-world works and they will be completely unprepared to cope with that reality.
People live long and healthy lives with this allergy, unless of course they get dosed by someone who doesn't take it seriously and can't get to an ER in time to survive.
But how?
If the mere hint of a peanut is that deadly to you and this child how do you manage? Peanuts and other nuts are everywhere!
And, no, I'm not being mean because I think it's a bit crazy to ask kids to literally wash out their mouths because the very air around a child could kill that child.
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Why on EARTH do you seem to think that this is a mere inconvenience or a preference?
Why do you think that if nuts are that deadly to a child that child is going to find it easy to function in the world? Is EVERYONE supposed to wash their mouths around this child? Are the parents going to walk around the local mall or supermarket demanding that total strangers undergo a nut inspection? That strangers within 20 miles of said child refrain from eating peanuts under any circumstances on the off change they might encounter this child? That every single neighbor wash their mouths out after every meal?
Do you honestly think this reasonable?
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Please do keep these opinions to yourself. Spreading this ignorance puts people's lives in danger. Obviously you don't care, but perhaps if you got the crap sued out of you for killing someone you might actually get the point.
That's a lovely attitude to go through life with. She eats nuts around me! She's trying to kill me!
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I think we all know who the jerk is here. Again, you seem to think we just don't like nuts?
You have no idea what you are talking about. Please stop.
And yours is?
Madame, you have no idea what you are talking about. At all.
Again I have to ask: if nuts are that deadly to you how do you manage in a world filled with them? If a mere hint of a peanut -- a widely used food product -- could kill you -- how do you function?
That doesn't make any sense at all.
These parents are making over the top demands and you are patting them on the back for it. At some point you have to just let it go. No one should have to rinse out their mouths or face a serious loss of education time merely to accommodate another person's medical needs.
Or else be on the receiving end of a bankrupting wrongful death suit.
Juries tend to be sympathetic to surviving parents who have lost a child, especially when that death can be shown to be preventable.
So you think a parent is going to sue a 6 or 7 year old for sneaking a candy bar at lunch? Actually, if it was these parents I could see that happening because they do seem to believe that the world should stop and revolve on their command.
You know what's "arrogant, boorish, insensitive and uncaring?"
You failure to acknowledge that people eat nuts because nuts are nutritious, delicious, cheap and a useful part of well balanced diet.
You don't read very well, do you? This has nothing whatsoever to do with some kind of anti-nut attitide. This is a medical condition that can be fatal.
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They don't eat them to annoy you.
You really don't get it. Cashews will KILL ME. This is not about being annoyed.
Do you just NOT get this? What the hell is wrong with you?
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Okay I am admit that right now I am indeed eating walnuts and cashews to annoy you.
I can see that you really do not understand this issue at all. I don't give a damn what you do if it doesn't put my life and the life of my kid in danger.
This is a serious issue. Not only do you make a fool of yourself trying to discuss something you obviously know nothing about, but you run the risk of your dangerous ignorance being spread.
So eat all the nuts you want but do those of us with lethal food allergies a favor. Shut up.
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But there's another side to the coin that you simply fail to admit because you are so caught up in the whole everyone who eats nuts is a jerk who wants to kill other people nonsense.
I have nearly died about half a dozen times, and all but one of those times was due to the negligence, dishonesty or apathy of others who, because they didn't care or read some article penned by someone like you, didn't take me seriously.
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You want to ban a common, cheap, nutritious food product; one that is widely adored by many children who often will not consume other food products.
Again, you don't read very well. I said no such thing at all. I said that reasonable accomodations should be made when it is apparent that someone has a lethal food allergy.
You don't seem to get the "lethal" part.
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Why? Because you write that even the hint of said food product could kill you. Do you understand that this sounds just a bit ridiculous to the rest of us?
Believe it, sister. How many more people have to die like this little girl did? Do you think she was faking?
Why don't you tell her parents what you've been telling me today. See how they react.
This is real. Do more people have to die before you get a clue?
You desperately need to get some education about this, or if not, just stop spreading your ignorance.
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That there's a huge difference to many of us between accommodating someone who is blind, deaf or in a wheelchair and literally asking small children to scrub out their mouths because a child is that medically fragile that even breathing the air of others will kill them?
You still don't get that this is a life or death issue, do you?
I've already said the school isn't handling it right.
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Ultimately, whether you like it or not, your health is your problem. Not mine. Yours. I will take reasonable precautions to help. But I'm not going to play peanut police for myself or my family because you have a freakish condition.
God forbid you should have to take any action that might prevent the death of another person's child. I mean, that would just be too much to ask of someone like you, wouldn't it?
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I strongly suggest you drop the attitude, stop with the over the top name calling and shake off your rather obviously overdeveloped sense of martyrdom.
I strongly suggest that you either get educated on this issue, or stop spreading your pernicious and dangerous ignorance about it.
It doesn't stop people from smoking in front of their children. I don't know about the number of smokers, I'd like to think the number has reduced due to government schemes. However do you have any evidence to show the air is cleaner? We pollute in abundance. In a third world country that has not been industrialised why would our air be any cleaner?And yes I explained before I think there may be multiple causes for allergies.
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Total emissions of toxic air pollutants have decreased
by approximately 40 percent between 1990 and 2005.
Since 1990, nationwide air quality has improved
significantly for the six common air pollutants.
These six pollutants are ground-level ozone, particle
pollution (PM2.5 and PM10), lead, nitrogen dioxide
(NO2), carbon monoxide (CO), and sulfur dioxide
(SO2). Nationally, air pollution was lower in 2008
than in 1990 for:
– 8-hour ozone, by 14 percent
– annual PM2.5 (since 2000), by 19 percent
– PM10 , by 31 percent
– Lead, by 78 percent
– NO2 , by 35 percent
– 8-hour CO, by 68 percent
– annual SO2 , by 59 percent http://www.epa.gov/airtrends/2010/report/highlights.pdf
I imply no such thing. You suggest that. I suggest that high mortality may prove a problem in trying to discover these things. Also I doubt a country with so many children dying examines the case for each death.
the only way your earlier premise -
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And try finding a third world country with a low infant mortality rate. Maybe then you will see the error in that challenge
-would make sense would be if the infants eliminated from the equation by this high rate of premature deaths were allergic to something.
so you do indeed imply exactly that.
So you think a parent is going to sue a 6 or 7 year old for sneaking a candy bar at lunch?
No, I think some very sad and depressed parents who lost their child because of SOME IDIOT who didn't believe food allergies could be lethal will sue the school, and hopefully the parents of the child that killed their kid.
You people need to understand that the stories you hear about how bad these allergies can be, as hard as they may be for YOU to believe, are a fact of life (or death) for some of us out there.
We only want to be safe. Why is that too much to ask from you people?
200 people a year die in this country from food allergies. Most of those deaths are preventable, and based on my experience, most of them weren't the fault of the person who died, either.
I think it would take watching your kid almost die, or have it happen to themselves, for some of the people on this thread to get a scintilla of a shred of a clue.
Really, if you don't know about this, at least PLEASE stop spreading the ignorance that kills people.
I do agree that these accomodations are over-the-top, and I suspect that they were designed that way to spark outrage.
I'd like to smack whoever came up with them, because they only serve to feed the ignorance out there about this condition.
And how do you think your incredibly, ridiculously, disgustingly nasty accusations in this thread help matters?
People will try to accommodate you. They will try to take reasonable steps to help, myself included. But they're not going to listen to you when you run around calling them all sorts of names just because they want to continue consuming food that is both cheap and nutritious.
If a child or an adult has allergies that are so serious that breathing in another person's air is dangerous to them that person has to figure out ways to cope. Hysterical demands and accusations that others are compassionless murderers are not coping. Asking people to literally wash out their mouths after every single meal, refrain from eating a common food product and walk around scrubbing down the walls because you have an odd digestive quirk is not coping.
[i]Now mind you, we always explain the situation to the waitstaff. We tell them that she has a life-threatening allergy to nuts. We ask about every dish. If we sense any uncertainty on the part of the server, we ask them to double check with the kitchen, and if it still isn't clear, we'll change our order or even leave. In spite of all this caution, we've had at least 6 cases where we ended up at the hospital. Two cases of a stray peanut in the middle of a bowl of Vietnamese noodles. Something cross-contaminated onto a loaf of bread in a German health-food restaurant. Two cases of sweet-lupine flour (who knew?) in industrial pastry crusts. Pine nuts in a phyllo appetizer at a very high end restaurant that caused us to miss her Step-mom's 60th birthday party. Most recently, a dish of stewed farro and pine nuts. The nuts weren't mentioned on the menu, the waitress swore it was a safe dish, and the dark color of the broth made it impossible to see them mixed in the grain.[/]
And how do you think your incredibly nasty accusations in this thread help matters?
Your posts represent the very WORST out there on this topic. You make light of a very serious issue, you irrationally and based on nothing more than your own ignorance say things that deserve the severe riducule you get.
IOW, you offended me first. I have suffered too many times because of people like you, who don't know and even worse, don't care.
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People will try to accommodate you. They will try to take reasonable steps to help, myself included. But they're not going to listen to you when you run around calling them all sorts of names just because they want to continue consuming food that is both cheap and nutritious.
Again, who said anything about that? That nuts are a cheap and nutritious food for most people isn't relevant to this discussion at all. I can only conclude that you STILL really do not get this.
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If a child or an adult has allergies that are so serious that breathing in another person's air
That is not the case. It requires a solid particle or droplet of oil. Again, this is ignorance - in this case on the part of whatever idiot wrote the OP article.
Point is, only one particle is necessary to cause a death. It is not that hard to avoid those particles IF PEOPLE ARE AWARE AND TAKE IT SERIOUSLY, which you seem to be unable to do.
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is dangerous to them that person has to figure out ways to cope. Hysterical demands and accusations that others are compassionless murderers are not coping.
Show me one hysterical demand I made here. As for my accusations, i think your posts support them just fine.
You obviously care more about not being inconvenienced that you do about someone's child dying.
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