Anonymous wrote:I am over other people’s allergies. Schools can separate kids that have extreme allergies to their own table/room.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our very small school implemented frequent, regular handwashing for younger grades. There is a child in one of the classes with many severe allergies. They wash hands before and after snack and lunch. No foods are banned at the school.

Yes there are different levels of implementation
1. Unless you want to pay parents with kids with allergies to stay to homeschool then they will be incorporated into public school. Handwashing and cleaning surfaces are the evidence-based practice. Not separate tables. Please recognize that Sally with an egg allergy eating a PBJ next to Tim with a peanut allergy eating an egg salad sandwich is literally no different than Sally seating next to Joe in her class with one seat between them or Tim sitting next to Carol, his classmate. Kids with allergies dont need to be excluded or sit separately from their classmates highlighting their differences. It also sets the tone that the general community does not need to absorb

2. Playgrounds are quite literally for younger children. Im not worried about an 8 year old not being able to mitigate risk. Its the 3 year old. Im also not expecting complete compliance but I do pose to all of you "I wont do that" posters. If you would wipe their hands before getting into your precious car (I have a feeling the no car eating, wont wipe their kids hands at a playground diagram has some serious overlap) or before touching your face or before your go into Mimi's house with all of its collectibles you can take the extra step of wiping their hands before returning to the playground. Many of you have admitted you wash their hands or wipe prior to eating and the reasoning for that, I assume, is to mitigate the risk of microscopic dirt or viruses/bacteria making your child ill. Ill add the example of cheetos fingers. That is on the extreme end of food residue. Peanut butter isnt much off of that. Nutella. Anything sticky or powdered. If you would remove cheetos dust, just imagine its cheetos dust.

3. Everyone seems to think that exposure and reaction is a cut and dry response. It's not. The derisiveness about contact reaction is unnecessary. There is a concept in the allergy world called the "allergy bucket". The IgE response is basically histamine overload which is why for mild reactions (one system) the treatment is antihistamines. But histamines are also produced by immune cells when you are sick or your body has/is mounting an immune response to a viral or bacterial antigen, they are increased when you are hot or when you exercise. As an aside, this is why with OIT you are on activity restriction because increased activity can flood histamines and trigger a reaction. Even if a kid has only previously reacted to known ingestion, say 1gram during a food challenge, that doesn't mean that in future physiological states they won't react to less than 1g because its summer or they were running around with friends etc. The kids who are contact reactive are rare and their parents dont take them places, I promise you they dont. I'm in the groups. They only host at their house, they dont travel, they dont dine out, they dont go to playgrounds when other kids are playing and their parents wipe the entire structure beforehand.

Allergy parents know how to navigate the world. Your comments about Target or the mall or a plane are extraneous. Those are mixed age communal spaces. Allergy parents are literally just saying at a playground which is designed for CHILDREN and in school, extra precaution would be nice. Kids in school get their 504 so legally they are covered (thankfully).

Anonymous wrote:I think the elephant in the room is the question as to how far does the majority bend to the needs of the minority? Who’s needs are more important and at what point do we tip too far?

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am over other people’s allergies. Schools can separate kids that have extreme allergies to their own table/room.

Agree. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Wow, that seems pretty harsh. I’m willing to be inconvenienced so that a child doesn’t end up in the hospital.

It’s more than an inconvenience to say you can’t bring several major ingredients for your own child’s lunch. The kids with severe allergies can have their own table were they are placed with enough distance to not contaminate each other’s areas. That is reasonable. Telling the whole school they can’t peanuts, soy, almonds, sunflower seeds, sesame, wheat, dairy, etc. for their own personal consumption in a lunch room is not reasonable.

Correct but this is why it's easier for schools and it's also lazy to say oh you just can't bring this in but they're not checking lunches, parents are not paying attention and even you have suggestions of a sneak it in because who is actually checking the lunches. The actual evidence-based interventions are hand-washing after lunch and cleaning the tables.
In the classroom they shouldn't share supplies and hand washing should happen after snacks it's literally that simple the problem is hand washing actually requires time and honestly from a allergy perspective and a non allergy perspective I would rather them focus on hand washing which would probably cut down on 50% of the colds and viruses that the kids exchange all the time.
I'm in allergy groups and we have the discussion all the time with parents of kids with allergies who want the school to be nut free completely disregarding that there are seven other top allergens and the school is not going to go dairy free or egg free. So there happens to be this prioritization of allergies where people are like oh well I understand the peanut but I don't understand wheat allergies they're all top nine. So again limiting one allergy from the school quote on quote because it doesn't actually work and nobody actually pays attention to it still limits the food choices of kids who have allergies and those that don't.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our very small school implemented frequent, regular handwashing for younger grades. There is a child in one of the classes with many severe allergies. They wash hands before and after snack and lunch. No foods are banned at the school.

Yes there are different levels of implementation
1. Unless you want to pay parents with kids with allergies to stay to homeschool then they will be incorporated into public school. Handwashing and cleaning surfaces are the evidence-based practice. Not separate tables. Please recognize that Sally with an egg allergy eating a PBJ next to Tim with a peanut allergy eating an egg salad sandwich is literally no different than Sally seating next to Joe in her class with one seat between them or Tim sitting next to Carol, his classmate. Kids with allergies dont need to be excluded or sit separately from their classmates highlighting their differences. It also sets the tone that the general community does not need to absorb

2. Playgrounds are quite literally for younger children. Im not worried about an 8 year old not being able to mitigate risk. Its the 3 year old. Im also not expecting complete compliance but I do pose to all of you "I wont do that" posters. If you would wipe their hands before getting into your precious car (I have a feeling the no car eating, wont wipe their kids hands at a playground diagram has some serious overlap) or before touching your face or before your go into Mimi's house with all of its collectibles you can take the extra step of wiping their hands before returning to the playground. Many of you have admitted you wash their hands or wipe prior to eating and the reasoning for that, I assume, is to mitigate the risk of microscopic dirt or viruses/bacteria making your child ill. Ill add the example of cheetos fingers. That is on the extreme end of food residue. Peanut butter isnt much off of that. Nutella. Anything sticky or powdered. If you would remove cheetos dust, just imagine its cheetos dust.

3. Everyone seems to think that exposure and reaction is a cut and dry response. It's not. The derisiveness about contact reaction is unnecessary. There is a concept in the allergy world called the "allergy bucket". The IgE response is basically histamine overload which is why for mild reactions (one system) the treatment is antihistamines. But histamines are also produced by immune cells when you are sick or your body has/is mounting an immune response to a viral or bacterial antigen, they are increased when you are hot or when you exercise. As an aside, this is why with OIT you are on activity restriction because increased activity can flood histamines and trigger a reaction. Even if a kid has only previously reacted to known ingestion, say 1gram during a food challenge, that doesn't mean that in future physiological states they won't react to less than 1g because its summer or they were running around with friends etc. The kids who are contact reactive are rare and their parents dont take them places, I promise you they dont. I'm in the groups. They only host at their house, they dont travel, they dont dine out, they dont go to playgrounds when other kids are playing and their parents wipe the entire structure beforehand.

Allergy parents know how to navigate the world. Your comments about Target or the mall or a plane are extraneous. Those are mixed age communal spaces. Allergy parents are literally just saying at a playground which is designed for CHILDREN and in school, extra precaution would be nice. Kids in school get their 504 so legally they are covered (thankfully).

Schools are mixed age communal spaces as well. A 504 plan does NOT give you any authority to dictate what other kids bring in their lunches, nor does it mandate schools to make a blanket ban on any food items. Schools may choose to do that as part of their own risk mitigation plan, or they may choose to set up a separate table or something else.

Anonymous wrote:DS has a baseball teammate allergic to sunflower seeds, which is quite unfortunate when baseball is your sport. His parents would have to ask umpires to not eat seeds when he pitched.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our very small school implemented frequent, regular handwashing for younger grades. There is a child in one of the classes with many severe allergies. They wash hands before and after snack and lunch. No foods are banned at the school.

Yes there are different levels of implementation
1. Unless you want to pay parents with kids with allergies to stay to homeschool then they will be incorporated into public school. Handwashing and cleaning surfaces are the evidence-based practice. Not separate tables. Please recognize that Sally with an egg allergy eating a PBJ next to Tim with a peanut allergy eating an egg salad sandwich is literally no different than Sally seating next to Joe in her class with one seat between them or Tim sitting next to Carol, his classmate. Kids with allergies dont need to be excluded or sit separately from their classmates highlighting their differences. It also sets the tone that the general community does not need to absorb

2. Playgrounds are quite literally for younger children. Im not worried about an 8 year old not being able to mitigate risk. Its the 3 year old. Im also not expecting complete compliance but I do pose to all of you "I wont do that" posters. If you would wipe their hands before getting into your precious car (I have a feeling the no car eating, wont wipe their kids hands at a playground diagram has some serious overlap) or before touching your face or before your go into Mimi's house with all of its collectibles you can take the extra step of wiping their hands before returning to the playground. Many of you have admitted you wash their hands or wipe prior to eating and the reasoning for that, I assume, is to mitigate the risk of microscopic dirt or viruses/bacteria making your child ill. Ill add the example of cheetos fingers. That is on the extreme end of food residue. Peanut butter isnt much off of that. Nutella. Anything sticky or powdered. If you would remove cheetos dust, just imagine its cheetos dust.

3. Everyone seems to think that exposure and reaction is a cut and dry response. It's not. The derisiveness about contact reaction is unnecessary. There is a concept in the allergy world called the "allergy bucket". The IgE response is basically histamine overload which is why for mild reactions (one system) the treatment is antihistamines. But histamines are also produced by immune cells when you are sick or your body has/is mounting an immune response to a viral or bacterial antigen, they are increased when you are hot or when you exercise. As an aside, this is why with OIT you are on activity restriction because increased activity can flood histamines and trigger a reaction. Even if a kid has only previously reacted to known ingestion, say 1gram during a food challenge, that doesn't mean that in future physiological states they won't react to less than 1g because its summer or they were running around with friends etc. The kids who are contact reactive are rare and their parents dont take them places, I promise you they dont. I'm in the groups. They only host at their house, they dont travel, they dont dine out, they dont go to playgrounds when other kids are playing and their parents wipe the entire structure beforehand.

Allergy parents know how to navigate the world. Your comments about Target or the mall or a plane are extraneous. Those are mixed age communal spaces. Allergy parents are literally just saying at a playground which is designed for CHILDREN and in school, extra precaution would be nice. Kids in school get their 504 so legally they are covered (thankfully).

Anonymous wrote:Our very small school implemented frequent, regular handwashing for younger grades. There is a child in one of the classes with many severe allergies. They wash hands before and after snack and lunch. No foods are banned at the school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm at a parochial school and we got a list of what we can bring to the Christmas party and it basically consists of gummy snacks, Capri Sun and chips, all individually packaged of course. Everything else is an allergen.

Unpopular opinion: schools need to stop asking parents to bring food for the entire class.

We don't need to have a gazillion parties where kids are stuffing themselves with chips and gummy candies. It's doing more harm than good.

Everyone packs their own kid's food so each kid is safe.

A school Christmas party can literally just be everyone eats their own lunch while they watch a Christmas movie together. Not everything needs to involve shared food.

Anonymous wrote:I'm at a parochial school and we got a list of what we can bring to the Christmas party and it basically consists of gummy snacks, Capri Sun and chips, all individually packaged of course. Everything else is an allergen.

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Anonymous wrote:So, you want people to thoroughly wash their hands after they eat a Snickers bar at a park with a playground?

Ideally, yes. People should wash hands before and after eating. In a lurch, where there is no sink or soap available, commercial wipes are sufficient to remove most proteins. https://www.foodallergy.org/resources/cleaning-methods Hand sanitizer with water doesnt work as well.

My kids use hand sanitizing wipes to clean their hands before they eat a snack outdoors, but I don't expect them to wipe after they eat because they get their hands dirty in other ways. (If they ate in a messy way, that's another story.) I certainly wouldn't expect them to wash their hands if they ate something out of a wrapper.

I won't pretend that I know anything about being an allergy mom, and I'm sorry that this is the hand you were dealt. I do have an autistic child though, and I realize that the world doesn't revolve around him, and I can reasonably expect certain accommodations, but it's on him and me to manage his needs. I think it's similar in your case. It's unreasonable for you to expect people to wash hands after having a snack at an outdoors venue. It's on you to find an alternative if your kid cannot handle a trace amount of an allergen.

Autism doesn’t run the risk of spontaneous death caused by going to lunch.

If you're worried about spontaneous death at the school cafeteria or playground, you absolutely should not be sending your kid to school. This is not about morals or empathy, as you're trying to make it to be. You cannot expect 100% compliance from 100% of the people 100% of the time. That is actually insane. Is it fair to you or your kid? No, but unfortunately life is not fair.

OR you could just not pack peanuts for lunch and then my child could be a part of society. You prefer to treat people like lepers as a “solution”. Seems like you just don’t want to be bothered.

Ok but now you're making it sound like it's just peanuts, because of just your kid and kids like him. But it's not. As other posters have pointed out, milk allergies are similarly prevalent and with similar severity. So now are we banning milk at school? No more milk cartons with school lunch? No more cheese on anyone's sandwiches? Shellfish and eggs might be easier to avoid in schools, but what about wheat? Soy? Or do you just care about peanuts?

90% of milk allergies are outgrown by age 3. Not that common in school.

But pretty common in preschool and daycare! Yet there are no bans on milk based infant formula, milk, yogurt, cheese

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, you want people to thoroughly wash their hands after they eat a Snickers bar at a park with a playground?

Ideally, yes. People should wash hands before and after eating. In a lurch, where there is no sink or soap available, commercial wipes are sufficient to remove most proteins. https://www.foodallergy.org/resources/cleaning-methods Hand sanitizer with water doesnt work as well.

My kids use hand sanitizing wipes to clean their hands before they eat a snack outdoors, but I don't expect them to wipe after they eat because they get their hands dirty in other ways. (If they ate in a messy way, that's another story.) I certainly wouldn't expect them to wash their hands if they ate something out of a wrapper.

I won't pretend that I know anything about being an allergy mom, and I'm sorry that this is the hand you were dealt. I do have an autistic child though, and I realize that the world doesn't revolve around him, and I can reasonably expect certain accommodations, but it's on him and me to manage his needs. I think it's similar in your case. It's unreasonable for you to expect people to wash hands after having a snack at an outdoors venue. It's on you to find an alternative if your kid cannot handle a trace amount of an allergen.

Autism doesn’t run the risk of spontaneous death caused by going to lunch.

If you're worried about spontaneous death at the school cafeteria or playground, you absolutely should not be sending your kid to school. This is not about morals or empathy, as you're trying to make it to be. You cannot expect 100% compliance from 100% of the people 100% of the time. That is actually insane. Is it fair to you or your kid? No, but unfortunately life is not fair.

OR you could just not pack peanuts for lunch and then my child could be a part of society. You prefer to treat people like lepers as a “solution”. Seems like you just don’t want to be bothered.

Ok but now you're making it sound like it's just peanuts, because of just your kid and kids like him. But it's not. As other posters have pointed out, milk allergies are similarly prevalent and with similar severity. So now are we banning milk at school? No more milk cartons with school lunch? No more cheese on anyone's sandwiches? Shellfish and eggs might be easier to avoid in schools, but what about wheat? Soy? Or do you just care about peanuts?

90% of milk allergies are outgrown by age 3. Not that common in school.