It has been a routine service for years, that airlines hand out little bags of peanuts during their flights. Especially during short hops.
Northwest Airlines is under attack by people with peanut allergies.
Now, I was born in the 50’s. You know. Lead paint on the windows, asbestos in the ceiling of the school, and mercury thermometers that you occasionally bit in half and DDT.
How is it, that within the last 20 years, peanut allergies have gone through the roof. Hell, that’s all most of us ate.
We weren’t even Lactose intolorent. Is it the hormones in the beef? Is it the spray they use on peanuts?
What the hell is going on?
If anyone has the answers, I’d sure like to hear them. BTW, The excuse that they have always had peanut allergies and didn’t know what they were won’t wash. I was tested in 1960 for every allergy you can think of including peanuts.
Born in 1972, diagnosed in ‘75. Its gets worse as you get older and more exposed. (Didn’t know that until the ’90’s). No answers on why there is so much more these days, but it’s a very small percentage that would really be affected by peanut dust, or contact.
Most places I can leave if there are peanuts, I have walked out of movies, my kids basketball game, never been to a circus etc. But a plane you are stuck. At the mercy of the others on the plane. No one wants to take a detour to the nearest airport for a medical stop so just eat your peanuts when you get on the ground.
Comment by Janet Klisiewicz — February 16, 2009 @ 5:01 pm
I’m allergic to the wheat in pretzels, but can eat peanuts. For the past few years, I’ve carried my own snacks with me when I fly. I wish they’d had an alternative to pretzels for me!
Comment by Cath — February 16, 2009 @ 5:31 pm
For people who do not know, allergies to peanuts and fish are nothing to joke about. There are many people who believe that their love of peanuts is more important than someone else’s life. Is a bag of peanuts worth the death of someone? The fact that some people do not know people who have these allergies does not make them not happen. My brother has severe allergies to fish and peanuts, both diagnosed in 1959. with peanuts, if he smells them, he will begin to get sick. In an airplane where the air is re-circulated, it does not matter if the person is sitting next to him or if the person is 25 rows away. His allergies to fish are similar, so much so that growing up, we could never have fish in our house. For those people who just have to have their snack, think about this. On one occasion, a friend of my brother who knew he had an allergy, but was not careful, gave my brother a bagel with cream cheese and lox. My brother took a bite and immediately spit it out. He was in the hospital for five days following that and came close to death on two times during that week. The doctor said that had he eaten that one bite, he would have been dead in five minutes. He would have the same reaction if he was in a contained room where fish was being cooked. While his peanut allergy is not as severe, he could die if exposed to enough peanut oil in the air, especially a contained flight.
IS SOMEONE’S DEATH WORTH A BAG OF PEANUTS THAT YOU CAN HAVE A FEW YEARS LATER
Comment by Wayne — February 16, 2009 @ 5:39 pm
I meant few hours later
Comment by Wayne — February 16, 2009 @ 5:40 pm
the best..to be ‘vegan’..
Comment by spainair — February 17, 2009 @ 12:12 pm
I have the answer to the peanut allergy mystery. I was curious about it and decided to search the Internet to see what I could find. What I finally put together was an “unofficial” study on food allergies and vaccines. I didn’t expect to find out what I did. I was totally shocked. Vaccines have many ingredients that do not appear on the package insert. The culture medium can contain much more than “beef extract” or “eggs”. The vaccine adjuvant (if they even call it that, they don’t have to) often has mixed vegetable and animal oils as an ingredient. The oils and the foods in the culture leave behind traces of food protein in the vaccine. The purpose of the aluminum in the adjuvant is to increase the body’s immune response to the protein in the shot. Since there is food protein in the shot, it creates a food allergy. There are studies where they innoculated animals with food protein to create food allergies. The main oils that are used in the adjuvant are: soy, peanut, sesame, fish, shellfish, wheatgerm. But many many oils are mixed together and used. What this does is make each shot unique. Not all the shots will have a trace of peanut protein. Some shots may actually have no trace of food protein. Other shots may have multiple traces. When I was a child, we got 2 vaccinations. Now American children were being told by government health officials and pediatricians to get 48 doses of 14 vaccines by age six and 53-56 doses of 15 or 16 vaccines by age 12. Peanut allergy has been a problem for a while but it became a much bigger problem when the recommended number of vaccines for children was increased substantially about 6 years ago. Peanut allergies are primarily caused by peanut oil in the vaccine adjuvant. Supposedly the trace amounts of food in the “pharmaceutical grade” (ain’t no such thing actually) oils used in vaccines are supposed to be nearly non-existant so it doesn’t cause a problem. It wasn’t a huge problem until they started vaccinating for everything possible. Now 8% of young children have food allergies and 1 in 70 people in the UK have a serious peanut allergy.
Comment by barb — February 21, 2009 @ 4:17 pm
I suffer from peanut allergies and its strange when I was a child I was able to eat peanut butter. (go figure) Seems like over the course of the last 5 yrs my body system has changed and now I am also allergic to cats and dogs as well.So you can imagine how much I have been suffering (post nasal drip itch eyes) I recently read a article on “kiwi drug” news about Flonase over the counter which is a nasal spray that at least I can get one bit of my ever changing allergies under control… rrrr
Comment by Veronica — October 14, 2009 @ 2:28 pm