Peanut ban in school?

[Floh]

I haven't read through all the new posts since I was here last, but I've just got to jump in!



Floh, I do not believe that we ever, under any circumstances, have the right to do anything that we KNOW will cause grave harm or death to others.

And in this case we are talking about causing grave harm and death to a little child! Where is the compassion?

OK. because you haven't read all the posts my sarcasm must have slipped by. what i was doing by capitalising and bolding out those words was copiying those who seemed to want to SHOUT their points out by capitaising. i was turning it upon them.

for frick's sake, of course people don't have a right to that disgusting (IMO) PB&J sandwich. i can't imagine who ever came up with the combination in the first place.

i'll learn to put a [/sarcasm] behind posts i don't intend to be taken seriously in future. but, honestly, if you'd read where people have been yelling through this thread you may realise why i did it right back. i'm sick to death of people SHOUTING AT ME!

i will say, if you read back, you'll see the PB&J sandwich isn't actually the thing under pressure here. apparently peanut products are in a myriad of things, from what i've read.

banning peanut products would give the food industry a huge overhaul, from what i can tell.

what's to be done, what's to be done? :doh:

 

[Amraann]

MY question is say they put a ban on peanut butter...
What then happens to the child who hugs his toddler sister getting out of the car and gets a smear on him and then the allergic child later in the day sits next to him and has a reaction???

I still think the solution is to have a designated class for those allergic.
As a parent of course I would not deliberately send in something with peanuts if one of my childs classmates was allergic but realistically your not going to get the parents of 600+ students to be that diligent.
That is why I say its ultimately on the parents.
Also it should be noted that in most Florida schools if a child does not have lunch money they are fed a PB&J

 

[eve]

I really should have quit reading. But like seeing a train wreck, I just couldn't turn away.



Eve, the difference in your example is that no one has deliberately, on purpose, introduced the bee into the classroom KNOWING A CHILD COULD DIE. Now if you or one of the other students were to bring a bee or two into the room and let it fly around a child who could die if stung.....THEN your example is applicable.

And believe me, Eve, if your child had a peanut allergy, no way would a ban at school create a "false sense of security." Parents of a child with a life threatening allergy will probably never, ever again have a sense of security, real or false.



Thank you, Jaxi. A tone of reason, just when I had about given up.



Yes, I think you could say more. Do you see the difference between KNOWINGLY sending your child to school with peanut butter and ACCIDENTALLY overlooking a trace amount on a sleeve? There is a HUGE difference, Eve.

Nobody is saying that a ban means chit won't happen. But it means it won't happen on purpose. It means most parents will band together, lovingly caring about the life of the child with the life threatening allergy.



And wanting to protect his child from exposure to the allergen while the child is supposedly in a safe atmosphere at school is NOT taking responsibility to take care of his child?

Come on, Jules. I betcha YOU have a big, fat sense of entitlement, too. Don't you feel entitled to have a safe school experience for your child? I know I sure have that sense of entitlement. Wouldn't you move heaven and earth to ensure your child's safety if you saw a threat to his/her LIFE?? I know I would.

People, again: We are talking life and death. Try to balance that with a stupid PB sandwich! Shouldn't LIFE win???

Ok, first of all, last week one of my students put a wasp down another student's jacket - on purpose. Two people in the room had bee allergies - one of them is me. People who know me here know I work with at-risk kids. It happened. I have to worry about peanuts and then some, believe me. And I do. I have said repeatedly - go ahead and ban them!

My opinion is that there will still be mishaps and once a "law" is passed it just creates an option to nail someone for liability for breaking the "law." That's where it gets messy. I am not looking forward to it being "my fault" that a kid somehow ingested peanuts on my watch.

Unless you have to watch a roomful of rowdies every day like I do and take all the resulting flack and worse, you just might not share my perspective.

I do a lot to help my students in all ways. They are economically and in other ways disadvantaged, and their parents are worse than worthless in most cases. They will NEVER follow rules about peanuts, they're cooking meth in the living room.

Also I have allergies, I have a kid with asthma and I have a stepson with Granulometous Disease. I can't afford to rely on a false sense of security.

Eve

 

[calus_3]

MY question is say they put a ban on peanut butter...
What then happens to the child who hugs his toddler sister getting out of the car and gets a smear on him and then the allergic child later in the day sits next to him and has a reaction???

I still think the solution is to have a designated class for those allergic.
As a parent of course I would not deliberately send in something with peanuts if one of my childs classmates was allergic but realistically your not going to get the parents of 600+ students to be that diligent.
That is why I say its ultimately on the parents.
Also it should be noted that in most Florida schools if a child does not have lunch money they are fed a PB&J

Again, you are using the exception to prove the rule.

You worry about the most miniscule transfer of peanuts or PB and use that as a reason not to prevent the certain exposure. Do nothing for the sake of doing nothing.

You can freaking educate your kid to death about what not to eat or what to eat but let them come in contact completely by accident on a table or a chair and golly, you have no kid no moe.

Cal

 

[eve]

Again, you are using the exception to prove the rule.

You worry about the most miniscule transfer of peanuts or PB and use that as a reason not to prevent the certain exposure. Do nothing for the sake of doing nothing.

You can freaking educate your kid to death about what not to eat or what to eat but let them come in contact completely by accident on a table or a chair and golly, you have no kid no moe.

Cal

If you had to take the rap for it Cal, you would too! We shouldn't do nothing Cal, ban away, but the bans better not involve liability for teachers, imo. Just remember your position Cal when people want to ban all sorts of other things. There are other food allegies which are very serious. Shellfish, gluten, etc. Lately I have been hearing a lot about fragrances, too. If it weren't so complicated it would be easy to say ban peanuts. It's just not that simple given how many ways peanuts apparently sneak their way into all kinds of foodstuffs.

Eve

 

[Rachael]

For goodness sakes, people, feed your kids peanut butter at home! Their lives will not come to a screeching halt if they can't have it at school.....but their friend's life just might.

The problem with this is as someone said in a previous post.. What if little Johnny has peanut butter for breakfast and does not wash his hands? He touches something at school and then another child with a severe peanut allergy touches it? It does happen. You can stop them from eating peanut butter in school, but you can't stop them from doing it at home. I know some children who are so picky they eat nothing but pb & j for lunch. I see both sides of this issue. If my child had a friend with a severe nut allergy I don't know that I would want the friend in my home b/c I would be so afraid of something happening to the child.

 

[eve]

For all in favor of a ban, here's my question. There's a ban in my school. All precautions are taken to enforce this ban. Make no mistake, where there's a ban on anything, there has to be an enforcement mechanism for same. So, in spite of the ban, little Nutter gets a reaction in my classroom and dies.

Now what?

Eve

 

[IrishMist]

People are forgetting that deaths due to peanut allergy are extremely rare.

Also that peanut airborne or touch allergies are also very rare.

Can a child have a reaction? Sure. Is it treatable? YES.

You can liken it to bee allergy, IMO, if you make children that are allergic go out on the playground.

Bottom line. If your child is allergic, teach them what to avoid, how to recognize their symptoms, how to treat themselves, and who to get help from at school.

 

[Amraann]

For all in favor of a ban, here's my question. There's a ban in my school. All precautions are taken to enforce this ban. Make no mistake, where there's a ban on anything, there has to be an enforcement mechanism for same. So, in spite of the ban, little Nutter gets a reaction in my classroom and dies.

Now what?

Eve

You get sued for taking on the original obligation of banning peanuts.
If the school assumes responsibility of banning peanuts and something goes wrong it makes them liable.

 

[eve]

You get sued for taking on the original obligation of banning peanuts.
If the school assumes responsibility of banning peanuts and something goes wrong it makes them liable.

Bingo! Exactement! That's when I may hang up my teaching license and go back to law. That is the problem with this whole issue. It's endless.

Eve

 

[Rachael]

People are forgetting that deaths due to peanut allergy are extremely rare.

Also that peanut airborne or touch allergies are also very rare.

Can a child have a reaction? Sure. Is it treatable? YES.

You can liken it to bee allergy, IMO, if you make children that are allergic go out on the playground.

Bottom line. If your child is allergic, teach them what to avoid, how to recognize their symptoms, how to treat themselves, and who to get help from at school.

I think most school that have children with nut allergies develop 504 plans for them. My nephew has a tree nut allergy. He cannot use the water fountain at school, just in case someone touched it after eating a nut product. They also have epi-pens in the nurses office and the teacher carries one around for him all day long. If he goes on any field trips he has to be accompanied by either the school nurse or his mother. His mother is happy because now she can go on every field trip (sometimes they pick names out of hats because they get so many requests from parents to go on the trips).

 

[Amraann]

Again, you are using the exception to prove the rule.

You worry about the most miniscule transfer of peanuts or PB and use that as a reason not to prevent the certain exposure. Do nothing for the sake of doing nothing.

You can freaking educate your kid to death about what not to eat or what to eat but let them come in contact completely by accident on a table or a chair and golly, you have no kid no moe.

Cal

Cal.... Let me give you another example.....
Say there is a child deathly allergic to bees....
Do you then not let ANY child in the school go outside for fear that one may upset some bees and the allergic one may get stung?
NO instead you teach that child to be cautious of bees, you keep an epi pen available.
Its not "do nothing" its teach the child the dangers of his/her own world.
Do you think for the rest of this child's life society is going to do it for him?
They won't and to set that as the example will be to put the child in greater harms way IMO.

 

[Jeana (DP)]

Your child does not have the right to a PB&J sandwich...

Actually, she does and she eats one every day at school.

 

[Amraann]

Originally Posted by Adrienne
Your child does not have the right to a PB&J sandwich...

Adrienne? I have an autistic child and like many autistic children he goes through phases when he will only eat certain foods ....
That is it, all day.

So lets say his favorite that week is PB toast (which has happend)
What is he suppose to do?
He will eat absolutely NOTHING else.
What is a feasable solution to this?

 

[Taximom]

I'm really disappointed in the direction this thread has taken. I'm glad Cal's last comments were removed as they were callous. Pun intended.

 

[Jeana (DP)]

I'm really disappointed in the direction this thread has taken. I'm glad Cal's last comments were removed as they were callous. Pun intended.

We'll take care of the problems. Just keep your comments on topic and we'll be fine!! :blowkiss:

 

[Jeana (DP)]

I think that if this thread, and the communities in which people live would just try and cooperate with one another, there wouldn't need to have "legislation" against taking a sandwich to school. If a child in the school one of my children attended had an allergy so bad that a sneeze could kill him or her, I would voluntarily agree to not send that food with my child. I don't see why we need to take away the "rights" of a child to have a certain type of food or why we need to get bitchy with one another on an internet forum in order to try and protect children from life-threatening allergies. If its that way where any of you live, that's sad. However, its not here and until I hear of a situation arising, I'm going to have to assume that out of the couple of hundred kids that attend school with my children, there's no need to call out the Senate to ban lunches.

 

[Adrienne]

Originally Posted by Adrienne
Your child does not have the right to a PB&J sandwich...

Adrienne? I have an autistic child and like many autistic children he goes through phases when he will only eat certain foods ....
That is it, all day.

So lets say his favorite that week is PB toast (which has happend)
What is he suppose to do?
He will eat absolutely NOTHING else.
What is a feasable solution to this?

Amraan - I have chosen to no longer debate on this thread -


I still do not see why there is a debate & so with that , do as you please - Have a great day!

 

[Maral]

I think that if this thread, and the communities in which people live would just try and cooperate with one another, there wouldn't need to have "legislation" against taking a sandwich to school. If a child in the school one of my children attended had an allergy so bad that a sneeze could kill him or her, I would voluntarily agree to not send that food with my child. I don't see why we need to take away the "rights" of a child to have a certain type of food or why we need to get bitchy with one another on an internet forum in order to try and protect children from life-threatening allergies. If its that way where any of you live, that's sad. However, its not here and until I hear of a situation arising, I'm going to have to assume that out of the couple of hundred kids that attend school with my children, there's no need to call out the Senate to ban lunches.

:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: Good post, Jeana.

I was on a flight recently where they announced that since the only snack they had on board was peanuts, they were going to dispense with the snack as there was someone on board that had a peanut allergy. What a concept! A reasonable solution without having to legislate a ban on peanuts being served on all airline flights.

 

[angelmom]

:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: Good post, Jeana.

I was on a flight recently where they announced that since the only snack they had on board was peanuts, they were going to dispense with the snack as there was someone on board that had a peanut allergy. What a concept! A reasonable solution without having to legislate a ban on peanuts being served on all airline flights.

It is a great plan. An even better plan would be if they had another choice for a snack.