I some do not really understand the “false sense of security” issue correctly. One major issue is that the children take more risks over time, such as touching surfaces without gloves.

Contact reactions are usually the fault of the allergic child. This may be harsh, but has to be said. We cannot allow these stories to silence that tough truth.

Think of what happens to the child’s character when he/she is raised with the idea that the person who had the nuts is responsible for his/her contact reaction, when he/she could have easily prevented the reaction by wearing gloves and keeping his/her hands out of his/her mouth/nose/eyes . He/she will not understand that he/she is responsible for himself/herself. He will blame everyone else for all his/her own problems in other areas of life.

Those with airborne allergies need to wear fine particulate surgical masks when in certain places. Immunocompromised people and those with severe environmental allergies do this and just accept it as part of life.

The basic principle is that those in the extreme minority need to adapt to the world and not force the world to adapt to them. It is morally wrong to force others to massively alter their diets, and possibly raise their food bills, just to avoid protecting oneself the way I described.

I am sorry about the death of Alex Baptist and others, but my views are unaffected.

I know that his school and the staff are not infallable, but am grateful that they have taken some steps to make my son safer. They have yet to have an incident and have several allergy kids – at every grade level.

To reduce the risk even further, I also talk personally with each teacher he has to impress upon them how real the danger is and to be vigilent in keeping all foods that I did not pack for him away from him. We also accompany him on all field trips. And we chose this school not only for their nut free class, but also because its less than a mile from the hospital.

I will say that the school nurse has impressed me. They ask that all allergy kids allow the school to keep the epipens after they have expired. They use the expired pens to train all staff that might need to administer an epi-pen. They inject the expired pens into fruit – like an orange or grapefruit, so that staff members have working knowledge of the pen – which direction it goes, how it feels to administer it. Real life experience is better than reading a label or looking at a chart. Afterwards, they dispose of the fruits safely, so no one consumes them. I just wanted to pass this along to all the other parents out there whose allergy kids are in school. Sharing ideas and practical tips can only help.

Vikki

Look I don’t know anything about the topic other than what I read through the many newspaper write ups that have covered it. Any cause that results in the death of a child should have you holding your tongue and feeling nothing but sympathy in relation to the topic. Especially when you can see that the Baptists have commented personally on this post.

Our thoughts go with the Baptists no matter what happened on the day.

Aaron

I’m sure that all our readers greatly appreciate your input.

Melanie and my thoughts go to your family over your loss. It is so tragic and close to home for us, that Melanie can’t even read the news story without breaking down in tears.

Aaron

In spite of my sons death I still believe nut free policies can work.One of the big problems that became apparant during the inquest was the complete lack of policing of the nut free policy – I had not realised how lacking this was until the inquest.

I agree with American that nut free policies must by logic reduce the risk by minimising the amount of product, although obviously staff and parents need to be aware the policy may be breached and thus need to be adequately trained to deal with it.

Also of interest in Montreal Canada approx 80% of schools went nut free and the incidence of incidental exposure decreased dramatically.

In addition you have to keep in mind it’s not good enough to just say that you’re nut free but this has to be backed up with vigilant monitoring of the policy and enforcement of the policy ( not ignoring it when it is breached). To say lets not have a nut free policy becasue people breach it is as dangerous as saying lets not have speed limits because people don’t stick to them anyway. Lets at least make the effort to keep people safe.In regards to other allergies and banning, the studies show that 90% of food fatalaties and near fatalaties are caused by peanut and tree nut so this seems like a logical place to start.

Our last three student deaths in Australia all due to peanut. Great idea to carry two epi-pens, though on the day Alex died two epi-pens were at the centre and staff were unable to sucessfully administer either of them, this is also despite instructions for use also being available on the action plan.

This highlights the need for adequate training and regular practice drills with a trainer epi-pen.I’m pleased to hear that there is discussion regarding Anaphylaxis as it is discussion and debate that will lead to education and better safety standards for children at risk of Anaphylaxis.

We like that our son is remembered. He was a darling, loving child.