If you know you have a severe allergy that might cause anaphylactic shock, you carry a self-injecting device that doses you with epinephrine (adrenaline), called an Epi-Pen. The problem exists when you don't know you have an allergy. Bee stings are the most common example of an unknown allergy. Most people with severe peanut allergies, know they're allergic given how common peanut products are.

Both my children have peanut allergies, but not so severe that exposure to peanuts triggers the reaction. However, our allergist says that some people do have such a severe allergy that mere exposure can trigger a reaction.

As a previous poster mentions, the physical allergy has been documented in peer-reviewed journals.

JS,

True!

Kind of like the guy that has a heart attack while making love, and the guy that has a heart attack watching porn. Both could die....they had heart problems, and we are more interested in which guy was doing what.

Glad you enjoyed your peanuts!

I friend of mine works for Southwest. He tells me that if (let me see if I can remember this correctly). If you call and tell them you have a reservation and that you are allergic to peanuts. That plane will not have peanuts served on it for 24 hours before your flight - which makes sure that it has gone through a regular daily cleaning, of vacuuming, etc. (not just the tidying up between flights).

I recently sat next to a high-revenue, full-fare, high-powered attorney, UGS member who told me that the primary reason he flies United is that it is peanut-free. He has a young daughter with severe peanut allergies. He went on to tell me that when he flies with his family, they always fly in Y; I'm not sure why, but he believes that Y is more peanut-free than C or F. He said that he is always granted early boarding so that he can wipe down the seating area his family will be using.

My wife is deathly allergic to peanuts. It is a physical issue, and not psychological at all. She has lived with it since she was 4 years old. I have had to take her to the hospital a couple dozen times in the last 33 years, usually for emergency treatment (epi and/or cortisone) and an overnight or two in Intensive Care.

If you drop a peanut on her hand and it bounces to the floor, her hand will welt up bright red before the peanut stops rolling.

If she actually was to eat a single peanut, it is likely she would die within 3-5 minutes, probably with no possibility of treatment, even if we were in the hospital waiting room.

Epi-pens are a great tool, but not an antidote. Once, my wife used two complete Epi-pen shots with absolutely NO relief whatsover. That was the ONLY time we had to call an ambulance for her, the rest of the times we have been able to drive to the hospital ourselves (albeit at fairly high speeds a couple of times). On this one bad occasion, my wife basically lost all blood pressure in front of the ER doctor, and the ER doctor completely lost it and started saying "I don't know what to do, I don't know what to do, I don't know what to do". I guarantee you NEVER want to encounter that bedside manner! My wife had no control over her body at all, but heard the entire discussion we were hearing, and heard the doctor lose it. How is THAT for confidence-building leadership?

Southwest apparently DOES offer to eliminate peanuts from a flight for someone with allergies. Continental, ATA, and America West apparently refuse to make any accommodations for passengers with peanut allergies. Most airlines will at least not serve peanuts within 10-20 feet of the allergic passenger. We have always been treated respectfully by airline employees when dealing with the allergy. Often they have made mistakes due to ignorance (a REAL BIG PROBLEM for those with the severe allergy), but never out of a rejection of the issue. You get to know how to deal with people, and it becomes just part of life. You know learn how to ask, how to escalate, how to cope, without inflicting pain on all the others around you. Not every person with allergies has learned those graces.

We ALWAYS call the airline in advance, and always get special assistance. AS recently switched from peanuts to pretzels for the whole flight for us. The procedure with them was to mark the PNR or the flight or both somehow, and they also asked us to repeat the request at the gate, and then to repeat the request at the first flight attendant. It worked. We didn't ask for peanuts to be removed from the entire flight, but they chose to as a precaution.

Only once has an airline chosen to make the (very embarassing) no private peanuts announcement because of my wife. On a 747 coming home from Europe. The flight proceeded without incident, but literally dozens of people figured out who the "guilty" party was, and more than a hundred people at the other end of the tube could easily have eaten pounds of peanuts without affecting my wife. Sometimes they get it wrong, as in this case, but I'd rather be safe than sorry.

Other people eating peanuts affect my wife, because their chewing turns into aspirations and peanut particles and oils then circulate in the air. In a restaurant, she simply leaves the table or moves to get away from someone that is poluting the air with (to her) deadly poisons. In a metal tube, with poor air re-circulation (due to fuel economy concerns), and the fact that you are sometimes REQUIRED to stay in your seat, one person eating peanuts two or three rows away CAN be a problem, but is not necessarily a problem. It depends on how recently she has recently encountered peanuts (the problem is cumulative for her), the air-re-circulation, the air flow, how tired she is, how carefully the person chews with their mouth closed, the oiliness of the peanuts, etc, etc.

We have had a bunch of close calls in life, but with the toleration of many, and the cooperation of those within 10-20 feet, she otherwise enjoys life just fine.

The problem, particularly in the US, is growing fairly rapidly. We hear of deaths frequently. We once talked with a New Zealand flight attendant that ripped the food plate out of her hands when she asked her first allergy question. Several weeks earlier, he served a little girl something with traces of peanuts in it, and she died within the hour while still enroute. He was absolutely paranoid.

There is information on many airpline websites on their policies. There are three types of responses:

1) ignore the issue, hope it goes away (it won't)
2) disclaim libaility, so hopefully they won't get sued if something goes wrong
3) a sincere attempt to meet the problem and work with the passenger and balance the needs of the individual with the needs of the entire plane.

Some people's allergies are in their head, not their body. Anaphylactics (like my wife) are so very real, and not imagined at all.

What is anaphylaxis? Anaphylaxis is a sudden, severe, potentially fatal, systemic allergic reaction that can involve various areas of the body (such as the skin, respiratory tract, gastrointestinal tract, and cardiovascular system). Symptoms occur within minutes to two hours after contact with the allergy-causing substance, but in rare instances may occur up to four hours later. Anaphylactic reactions can be mild to life-threatening. The annual incidence of anaphylactic reactions is about 30 per 100,000 persons, and individuals with asthma, eczema, or hay fever are at greater relative risk of experiencing anaphylaxis.

Some interesting websites:
http://www.foodallergy.org/Advocacy/airlines.html
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030613.html

THANKS, 925, for that informative post on a truly serious topic of which we should all be aware.

I never realized how serious the peanut allergy was until a few years ago when I was teaching a night class at a local university. Before the first night of classes, a student contacted me requesting I meet with her outside the classroom. She explained her situation and knew that it was customary for night school students to bring snacks into classes, so she requested that I announce to everyone right off the bat that there was a student with a situation, etc., and if I would not, she would have to drop the class. She was embarrassed to be identified as the student with the issue, which made me feel really bad. She had a few near-death experiences just through mishaps, and had explained that she can't even be in a room with traces of peanuts.

I have noticed a lot more product labelling in the last couple of years re: "this product is made on equipment that may have come in contact with peanuts."

Occasionally this has been helpful, but usually for us, it actually makes it worse! For a while, some manufacturers were plastering their labels with the warning, just so they could reduce their liability. They never intentionally used peanuts, but they wanted to be sure... The problem is, when every food product starts saying it might have peanuts, you either have to stop eating everything - and starve - or ignore the label - and maybe die!

Somebody (maybe the FDA?) must have come down on that practice, because it has dramatically receded.

We do NOT want cover-your-butt labeling. We do want truthful labeling, when the situation is warranted. It is a VERY delicate balance for the person with severe allergies.

My wife reads every label everytime she shops... a painful process. I don't grocery shop with her anymore as it is so frustratingly slow...

I had a feeling that part of it was cover-your-... liability. Ugh...

But all the best to her in 2005 and beyond...it's a life challenge that most of us could never imagine!

Thanks for the informative post 925.

I've met people on the plane who tell my they fly United specifically because they're a "peanut free" airline.

SNA1K: (1) They can't discriminate against disabled passengers who travel with service animals (2) The accountants love those exorbitant "cabin pet" charges

When they tell me I can't bring my own Coca-Cola� Classic onboard, then they've gone too far...

It's either you wait until the enxt flight or the dog's owner waits until the next flight and that time the baggage compartment was not prepped for pet transport and the airline sided with the dog's owner. Whereas with peanuts, they can remain sealed in their wrapper while their owner stays on board.

Travel tips:
http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/travel.htm

I have witnessed anaphylactic shock in a woman with an unknown allergy to mangoes, one of my favorite fruits.

It was truly horrifying. Fortunately, her husband, a physician, had a dose of adrenaline in his bag.

Hopefully this thread will be informative, and perhaps even change attitudes and behavior, for all who read it. ^

I have severe allergies as well. I always carry my meds. This passenger should carry an epi-pen.


I saw that same program and his parents were eating snickers bars.

At this point, this really has very little to do with any UA-specific topic. Since it is of much wider interest than just UA, I am moving to TravelBuzz.

cblaisd
Moderator, United

That must have been terrifying for her- had she never eaten mangoes before, or did she not realize that she had had an allergic reaction to them in the past? They way I've heard it explained, your first reaction to something doesn't usually cause anaphlactic shock, but your second or third or so can cause it.

Yeah, anyone with any kind of food allergy/sensitivy is a pain to shop with. I have a food sensitivity to some food preservatives.... technically it's not an allergy, although I have a couple of those too, and I usually explain it to people as an allergy- makes everyone's life easier. It's a massive annoyance- I have to read the labels of everything I buy, bring my own food on flights/to work/everywhere, bc I get very sick within 20 minutes of eating or drinking either sodium benzoate and potassium sorbate. My friends are really good about it, having seen me get sick a few times- they won't cook anything for me without carefully inspecting all the labels.

The upside of it is that I don't care how bad airplane food is, because I can't eat most of it anyway. If it's not fresh fruit or ice cream or in a package with all the ingredients on it, I'm not touching it.