UKC

I saw something recently that seemed to suggest that some airlines no longer offer nuts or nut products as snacks etc.

It seems this is due to the fact that some people suffer from "nut allergies"; yet I remember flying in the sixties, seventies and eighties when nuts were freely available - usually as a snack with a drink - on flights. I have flown long haul and domestic frequently and never been aware of a problem.

This, and other "food allergies" appear to have become more "publicised" within the last twenty or thirty years.

I do wonder if it's something to do with "modern living" and if the banning of nuts by the airlines is a product of the compensation culture.

In reply to FesteringSore:

I'm not aware of any airlines banning them, but I have been on flights where they've announced that they wouldn't be settling nuts due to the presence of passengers with nut allergies

In reply to FesteringSore:

not exactly a huge loss is it, nuts arent essential.

In reply to FesteringSore:

Back when smoking was allowed in the planes the air was constantly 'changed' in the cabin, but ever since it was banned the air gets re-circulated, meaning that air-borne bits of nuts now get sucked through into the air system and then redistributed all over the plane, again and again.

FWIW a girl almost died a couple of weeks ago because of this.

In reply to FesteringSore:

Here http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/11036175/Ryanair-bans-passenge...

In reply to FesteringSore:

I met someone who had a really bad allery to flour. If she went into a room where someone had been baking, she would come out in hives. Pretty grim life really.

In reply to FesteringSore:



I've wondered about this. Did people just die previously?

In reply to FesteringSore:



Why the inverted commas? People really do get severely ill from nut allergies, and it isn't particularly rare.

An aeroplane doesn't seem like the best place to be when you suddenly need hospital care, either!

Anecdotally, a colleague's wife has to carry an EpiPen at all times due to suffering from anaphylaxis on exposure to peanuts, and a school classmate of my wife died from anaphylaxis after eating something that turned out to not be peanut-free after all.


Maybe. Or is it just that diagnosis is better?


If you mean that they're penalised by their insurance companies, for failing to take measures, to reduce the risk of claims, by trying to keep their passengers safer - then probably! I don't see this as a bad thing, though.

In reply to skog:

Well the point I was making is that it seems to be a relatively recent phenomenum and that it's only recently that airlines(and others) have been taking these measures. "This product may contain nuts" simply didn't exist a few years ago.

I also understood that there were certain precautions/meds these people could take.

In reply to FesteringSore:
Allergies are becoming more and more common, so awareness has been raised, along with planes using reconditioned air rather than fresh.

http://www.allergyuk.org/allergy-statistics/allergy-statistics

On top of that planes are not the best place to go into Anaphylaxis. Epi-Pen/Jextpens are not 100% reliable, and when they do work it is easy to go back into shock after 15 minutes when you need to use a second shot and repeat. I have used epi-pens 4 times (out of 7 reactions), on one occasion 3 shots where used before I made it to hospital. I don't have allergies to peanuts but strawberries + kiwi but the same rules apply.

The only precaution you can make is to avoid contact/exposure to peanuts.

In reply to FesteringSore:


Compare "Smoking is hazardous to your health" messages, and the banning of smoking on aeroplanes.

Progress is good, isn't it?


Well, they can carry EpiPens (to improve their chance of surviving), and try to avoid whatever sets them off (e.g. letting airlines know their difficulty so they can ban nuts on their flight!)

In reply to FesteringSore:
One of my cousins has to carry an EpiPen due to having a nut allergy.

I don't know a lot about it, but I gather that for him it's serious.

In reply to FesteringSore:

Nuts =money

In reply to John Rushby:


What do you mean by that?

In reply to aln:

lots of things.

lots

and

lots.

I note you bought a brush set recently. Interesting - soft handled and with clip up dust pan.........