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Air Canada Ordered To Provide Nut-Free Zone
JamJam writes "Air Canada has been told to create a special 'buffer zone' on flights for people who are allergic to nuts. The Canadian Transportation Agency has ruled that passengers who have nut allergies should be considered disabled and accommodated by the airline. Air Canada has a month to come up with an appropriate section of seats where passengers with nut allergies would be seated. The ruling involved a complaint from Sophia Huyer, who has a severe nut allergy and travels frequently. Ms. Huyer once spent 40 minutes in the washroom during a flight while snacks were being served."
Should there also be a shrimp free zone for those who are allergic to shrimps, and a strawberry free zone for those who are alergic to strawberries, and maybe a sweater free zone for those who are allergic to sweaters?
I'm allergic to idiots. Is there anywhere in Canada I will be able to travel?
I'm allergic to noisy babies and children who kick my seat-back. Where's my zone?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
And I want all nut-jobs banned from life. Good luck with that.
Like almost all US airlines have done. Of course Ms. Huyer will then complain that everyone will be getting snacks but her... (not to make like of nut allergies, which really can be deadly. But a "nut free zone" in an enclosed space with recirculated air? Just switch to pretzels and be done with it.)
The Canadian Transportation Agency has ruled that passengers who have nut allergies should be considered disabled and accommodated by the airline
If they are ruling that they are disabled, should they also allow them to park in the blue spaces?
If you can get past Customs, the rest of the country will be just fine for you...
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
In some cases, if the allergy is severe enough, it's enough to be in the same room/space as whatever you are allergic to.
CBC story about Air Canada having to provide nut-free zones on account of allergies...
...and another CBC story about Air Canada allowing pets in their cabins starting in July. Err...
Can I please have a special government-enforced seating zone that has an extra 6" of leg room, at no extra charge?
Many people with severe nut allergies can suffer serious allergic reactions on contact with nuts, even things that come in contact with nuts. Your skin is quite happy to absorb many things that get on it.
Platform advocacy is like choosing a favorite severely developmentally disabled child.
The potential for cross-contamination with nuts is surprisingly high. Just a little bit of peanut in the wrong place can be deadly. For this reason, entire school districts are "nut-free" with kids actually getting in trouble for bringing peanut butter sandwiches to school. I'm not sure if it's a good thing (protect the small population that has a severe nut allergy) or a bad thing (inconvenience everyone else), but apparently a lot of people do care about this issue.
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Can anybody provide any real evidence that nut allergies are triggered by the "smell" of nuts? I don't think so -- as far as I know they have to be aerosolized in a cooking spray or finely crushed and thrown into the air as "nut dust". I'm betting this woman is probably just a hypochondriac who thinks she's being affected by smelling nuts when she's not. This article http://www.nationalpost.com/related/topics/story.html?id=2417934 mentions that her claim is backed up a doctor's note saying that she has a reaction when in the general vicinity of nuts, but other than that there's no real evidence for this.
Air Canada and other organizations should first order complete medical studies on people like this to get the facts before taking action. Clearly, the public needs more evidence because special treatment for allergy sufferers and public bans of nuts are getting out of hand.
A quick Google search reveals the beginnings of a Britannica article which also indicates that banning nuts is a bad idea since nut allergy deaths are not unacceptably higher annually than deaths from lightning strikes and bee stings, and because banning creates a climate of oversensitivity: http://www.britannica.com/bps/additionalcontent/18/35883327/Peanut-hysteria--or-is-it
Funny Story:
My sister was flying somewhere for a class trip. Stupid kids being stupid kids someone started a food fight and she ended up getting decked with a peanut butter cookie. My sister is severely allergic to nuts. The only thing that saved her life and everyone else getting diverted was the fact she had an emergency epi pen in pocket and was able to use it.
While I find this story a bit silly, I can understand this woman's plight. I think I would be rather upset if an airline told my sister to piss off because she was allergic to nuts. Breathing in the smell of peanuts is enough to make it hard for her to breath. We could never use peanut oil at home for this reason. I just don't really see a good solution other then not serving nuts on a flight with an allergic. Which is reasonable on a case by case basis in my opinion. There just isn't a real good solution to make everyone happy.
I know it is not PC to say, but this is a sad joke. People should get over themselves and stop demanding the world change around them. It is as if "only-child syndrome" is now the standard. I am starting to find myself allergic to work, bills, and anything that inconveniences me in the slightest. The plane does not bother me as I do not fly; I am allergic to paying for tickets but the airlines refuse to accommodate me. And I do not need to park in the blue spaces, as I am allergic to parking in spaces; I need to just get out of my car where I want. Now if the police would stop discriminating against me by towing my car when I leave it on the sidewalk! They will all regret it when I file a lawsuit and they learn I am allergic to verdicts against me!
Member of American Sarcasm Society - Motto: "Like we need your help!"
Flying with Air Canada it helps if you are nuts.
Those nut allergic people should be forced to watch the movie Gattaca whilst flying and thank god that fiction hasn't become reality (yet)
According to this pets are now allowed on Air Canada, although many people with allergies object and can no longer fly because of this. But nuts (which don't get carried in the air as much as pet dander) are not allowed?
Am I the only one wondering WTF?
I wonder if some of the reactions that people with allergies have when exposure is very low are trained responses. Like Pavlov's dog, ring the bell and start salivating, smell peanut butter and start choking.
My only basis for this is personal experience with chemo-therapy. After just a few rounds of treatments, just DRIVING to the hospital was enough to start me throwing up. It was bizzare and extremely frustrating to be sitting in the chair getting hooked up to a saline only IV and having to hurl. No matter how hard I tried to reason with myself, I was getting sick from the drugs that were no where near my body, much less in them and taking affect yet.
My thought is that people who have had a bad experience with a real allergic reaction have very quickly and effectively trained their brain to induce the reaction response at even the smell of the allergen.
Anyone else have similar experiences / theories about the validity of 'nut-free' zones?
ps - just to be clear, I'm not suggesting the reaction isn't happening, but just curious if it real or trained. If trained, maybe people can be trained out of it and then live less intrusive lives. BTW, 15+ years later I'm basically fine - hospitals don't bother me much, however, there is still a certain ladies deo / perfume that makes me feel queesy.
I'm in my right mind and I have the answer to everything!
I can. My oldest son is extremely allergic to peanuts, almonds, and most other kinds of nuts. He has to carry an epi-pen with him wherever he goes. One day, my son's class went on a field trip to a farm. He started looking sick, and his face started to swell. Fortunately, the teacher saw it, gave him some Benadryl and he was fine for the rest of the afternoon. Turns out that the farm was near some peanut-growing farms and it was right in the midst of harvest season, so the peanut dust was in the air.
We've also had instances where my son was near some kids at school who were having a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, and my son started getting sick. Again, Benedryl was administered, and the school made sure that if someone had peanut butter in their lunches, they had to sit at least one or two seats away. Worst case, my son had to sit at a different table (although some classmates did come and sit by him).
It's not fun, dealing with allergies like this, but taking sensible precautions helps avoid a true life-or-death problem.
He opens up his briefcase, pulls out a Playboy, drops his pants, and proceeds to have a wank.
The woman is horrified.
When the man is finished, he pulls up his pants, closes the briefcase, and then turns to the woman and asks:
"Do you mind if I eat nuts?"
Baba-boom-ching!
Thank you, tip the veal, try the waitress . . . etc.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
I'm serious. I've been on flights where fellow passengers apparently subscribed to the "perfume instead of a shower" school.
And it was disgusting, and made my flight a hell, with clogged sinuses and the concomitant ear congestion that results in excruciating pain until the congestion clears (oh, it only takes a few hours). Benadryl and Claritin and any other anti-allergy drug don't help.
Back then people with serious genetic defects like being allergic to a major food group died. A shame that medical science has decided to shit in the gene pool.
when i was growing up, no one had this problem, but now it seems that it is almost commonplace. is this a symptom of something we've done lately (to our food source perhaps), or a symptom of me just not getting exposed to news sources as a kid?
In some way, this is all Jimmy Carter's fault.
Today is red jello day - all workers must eat all of their red jello. Failure to comply will result in five demerits.
And next passengers will be forbidden from bringing in any food. The airlines would love such a restriction, similar to that of most movie theaters and sports venues, to sell overpriced food to a captive audience.
when i was growing up, no one had this problem, but now it seems that it is almost commonplace. is this a symptom of something we've done lately (to our food source perhaps), or a symptom of me just not getting exposed to news sources as a kid?
It's a symptom of hypochondria which has spiralled out of control. It's also self-perpetuating, because it's been proven that many allergies are caused by over or under exposure to a certain thing during the early years. Peanut allergy particularly is caused by this because parents just don't give the kid nuts just in case they are allergic.
I drink to make other people interesting!
I'm sorry, and I mean no offense, but that's not evidence. The problem with parents who tell these tales about how peanuts are like kryptonite to their kids or they're allergic to X in food is also he reason why we shouldn't base public policy on anecdotal evidence (there's another comment below about someone "who knows a family with a son who...")--so please don't take this as if I'm targeting you specifically or questioning he veracity of what you're relating; I'm just pointing that this is isn't how we gather evidence on public health issues and the stories told by parents shouldn't form the basis of public health policies.
The thing is, in the scenarios you're describing, you have a son who is quite allergic to nuts, I'm going to guess because he had something with peanuts actually in it at some point, or came into contact with the oil, and after that happened a couple of times with an allergic reaction, you figured out he was allergic. And people at the school and around him basically know this, too.
So now, when your son doesn't feel well, on a field trip, or at school, everyone looks around for the nuts. And lo and behold, you're next to a peanut farm. Or a kid at the table is having a PB&J. Or you find out his playmate had peanut butter pancakes that morning, or a snack made in a facility processing pine nuts. Or whatever. And you have your "explanation."
Except that you don't actually know how frequently your son is exposed to "peanut dust" or "contaminated surfaces" or whatever, and doesn't have a reaction. Maybe he's allergic to something else, or maybe not. Or maybe it goes down exactly as you suspect. The problem is that in the absence of a controlled study, we just can't tell. And while it makes sense (maybe) for you to just be on the safe side with regard to nuts, it doesn't make sense to make rules, regulations and laws with significant costs for others without that peer-reviewed, study-based justification.
Anyway, I hope people take this as the call for more information and for better study of the public health implications of allergies that it is, and not as an attack on a dad and his son, which it certainly isn't intended to be.
demi
Peanut butter sandwiches are a staple of childhood, are cheap, and are relatively nutritious. It's a bad thing.
Better than announcing "no peanuts will be served, because of the passenger in seat 17D".
There was a recent story about electrical (not hybrid) cars being so quiet, that blind people don't hear them. I only learned from reactions to that story that guide dogs don't actually see traffic. Always thought they did, but they just see the curb and then the blind person has to decide wether it is safe to cross. A bit hard with a silent car you cannot see...
So... how far do we go? Do we actually have to make silent cars make noise for a small percentage of people? It can't be easy being blind, I notice that in Holland around Utrecht there seem to be a lot recently traveling by public transport (not all fully blind of course) and you can see the problems. Snow? All of them gone, if the bus stops away from the curb, they can't readily see the entrance. If the stop is not used for some reason, the orange bag over the sign won't be seen. They can't check time tables, can't see announcements about altered routes.
So, do we even bother with them? Or tell them to go back to their institutions? Lock them up?
Like many others, i find the peanut allergy a bit silly. Where do you draw the line? You mean that if this person smells someone's peanut breath, they die? How do they life? You can ban peanuts from aircraft but not from the rest of the world. What about taxi's? The street? What if I bring peanuts on the plane myself? What if I work in peanut factory?
And what if someone is allergic to this woman? Say her scent? Will she comply with that? Wanna bet she drives her car despite people having asthma?
But there is a real danger in arguing what the parent argues. It is only a small distance from that and the gas chambers for those who are a drag on society. Already babies are euthanized because they are considered unfit to survive. Or in less advanced countries (such as the US), left to starve on their own because that is what god wants...
No, it is all to easy to say there is a line, but drawing that line sets a dangerous precedent. Once such a line has been drawn, beyond which point you are considered not worth "it" to society, that line can be moved. And it may never happen that this line reaches you, but that is a terrible way to life.
Personally, I think it can be solved rather simple, let her wear an isolation suit on the flight. Problem solved and you can use it in more situations then just aircraft. And the rest of the passengers just have to deal with it, just as you accept wet dog smell from a guide dog. Because we are human beings and we are better human beings if we don't live by survival of the fittest. Remember that the greatest mind alive today is probably also the least fit person.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I realize this is Slashdot, dammit but peanuts are not nuts; they are legumes. However, the tendency amongst us is to lump these legumes in with actual nuts, gonads and any unrelated item that can produce a snicker. Please continue.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
I'd disagree with you as to the symptoms of my son not being considered evidence (e.g. the swelling, difficulty of breath he got during these episodes). Your point, however, is correct - too many parents of kids who have these allergies get overly paranoid, and want to throw out the peanuts altogether just because. (Also, didn't feel targeted).
Yes, he did come into contact with some peanut based foods, and the extreme sickness he got sent us to the doctors where we did get the testing done, and education for us to identify how to recognize the symptoms, and how to deal with it (e.g Benedryl/anti-histamine first, then if they start throwing up and can't keep Benedryl down or face is swelling a lot/breathing issues then apply the Epi-Pen and get to hospital).
Actually, we don't. If he has the specific symptoms of anaphylaxic shock (e.g. swelling of face, breathing, and throwing up) we treat the symptoms as we were taught. However, if he gets sick and isn't showing these symptoms, we do the normal care we would for any other normal kid (when H1N1 went through my house, we didn't go searching for the peanut bogeyman).
Excellent point - you're correct, we really don't know. However, in my son's case, we did have him tested (and unfortunately for him he tested out at the top of the sensitivity scale). We do take proper precautions (e.g. have some space between kids if one is having a PBJ sandwich) to make sure that he doesn't get unnecessarily exposed, but we don't worry too much about it now. However, the last thing I want to do is to ban all peanuts from everywhere - it's something that my son is aware of, and knows how to live with.
The way I remember it:
The man sneezes. He takes out a tissue, wipes his nose, then unzipps his pants, reaches in and wipes there too. After repeating this a few times, the woman asks, "What exactly is your problem with the Kleenex in the pants?".
Rather embarrased, he replies, "I suffer from a condition where I orgasm every time I sneeze."
After a bit, she asks, "Isn't there something you could take for that condition?"
"Yes. Pepper."
Have gnu, will travel.
There's been some research recently that focused on children's exposure to garden-variety dirt and pets vs allergy incidence. Those with more exposure to this sort of "dirt" (what we evolved around in the first place) were significantly less likely to develop random allergies, because their immune systems had been stimulated at a reasonable level and had "learned" to handle it. However, kids that lacked such exposure were much more likely to develop allergies -- lacking prior "experience" as it were, their immune systems tend to overreact (which is what an allergy IS) when they encounter "unknown" substances.
I'm too lazy to look up a cite but I'm sure you can find plenty about this.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?