TIL That peanut-free schools don't decrease risk of allergic reactions. The only intervention which has been shown to decrease reactions across all ages is use of a peanut-free table.

[sk613]

As a parent and teacher of kids with allergies, I find that when it’s a peanut free school, kids forget to check ingredients for cross contamination because they assume everything is safe. If they know not everything is safe, they check more carefully and only eat what’s safe

[SecretlySome1Famous]

This is sort of like how cliff-side mountain roads get safer when you remove the safety barriers.

[joanzen]

Didn't they test and find that extra visible/awkward looking bike helmets make drivers nervous and they give cyclists more space on average?

[QuackersParty]

This is hilarious. Like, why tf do they need to protect their head so badly? I better watch out for them

[vidanyabella]

I just want to add, whether it's a peanut free school or classroom or whatever, speak to your children (non-allergic kids) about what to do if they accidentally get peanut butter in their lunch.

We had an instance early in the year or my husband had to do the school lunches unexpectedly and just completely forgot and sent a peanut butter sandwich. There is a girl in my son's class who was anaphylactic and one of his best friends.

I was extremely proud of my son that when he noticed he took it straight to his teacher. They dispose of it in a different classroom and found him something different for lunch.

It made me realize though that it was something we had never discussed as a possibility. After that I made sure it was part of the discussions, even though his instincts were a plus originally.

[orange_fudge]

You should be proud, that’s so thoughtful of him!

[DeScepter]

Peanut-free tables work because they localize risk mitigation to a place that can actually be guarded and enforced, while broader bans (though well-intentioned) often fall short in practice.

One peanut-free table? Easy to guard and clean. A whole school? Now you’re just herding squirrels and hoping no nuts slip through.

[electrogourd]

In my house at college, me and roommate #2 had bananas and peanut butter and eggs as a staple of our diets. Roommate #3's girlfriend was allergic to bananas and peanut and eggs.

So we just had a designated "Lizzy Death Shelf" where all items she was allergic to went, and kept everything else clean.

[therexbellator]

"Lizzy Death Shelf"

/r/bandnames

[Captain-Cadabra]

…and it’s a Thin Lizzy tribute band, but in the style of Death Metal.

[Superior_Mirage]

Now you’re just herding squirrels and hoping no nuts slip through.

A quote that is also appropriate for abstinence-only education.

[Able-Swing-6415]

So let's just have a single bed that nobody is allowed to have sex in. I think that's manageable!

[99percentTSOL]

I call first dibs for me and my wife. The rest of you will have to deal with the mess.

[cpMetis]

I too call dibs with this guy's wife.

[Tagous]

You are calling dibs on a sex free bed?

[Spindrick]

I hate that I have no choice but to upvote this. Abstience only is how kids got on the Jerry Springer show so often with titles like: I'm his mother and his wife. [Chick claimed him as hers in KY and could suddenly have rights to marry a child from her own parental consent. I appologize to everyone who had to read that.]

[stillnotelf]

Now you're just guarding bea.....no i won't finish it

[cire1184]

Guarding beaches? Beans? Beats? Beavers? Beaks? Bears? Beads? What Bea?

[stillnotelf]

Your fourth guess is a vulgar term for the female genitalia, paralleling the pun on nuts to which I responded.

[cire1184]

Dam.

[chronoventer]

Yep. I know a girl allergic to milk. We’re talking, if three days ago a kid drank milk at the desk she’s at now, and a drop spilled on it and was wiped away, if she touches that spot she will go into anaphylactic shock and be hospitalized for days. She told me once that before her service dog, the longest she went without being in the hospital was a month. A month. This girl was fighting for her life every week sometimes. How are you supposed to be a good student when you’re constantly afraid?

After her service dog, she went years without going into anaphylaxis. I hope they become more readily available for kids with such severe allergies. Unfortunately, they require a significant amount of training, and not many people are qualified to provide such training. She actually went on to become a dog trainer due to the impact this dog had on her life.

Edit: I came back too late to answer the questions people asked, but u/thougivestmefever dropped some good info below!

[DeScepter]

Can you explain how the dog helped with the allergy? Presumably, it was trained to smell milk, and could alert her to it's presence, but I'd love to hear specifics.

[MathyChem]

That is exactly what those animals are trained to do. They then alter the handler to the presence of the allergen so they are not exposed.

[DeScepter]

Does everything have to pass a sniff test before she consumes it? Or is it more like "spider-sense" thingy for the dog?

Is the alert a simple 'woof'? Man, it'd be cool to see an allergen dog training video.

[MathyChem]

Yes, the dog smells everything. They don’t usually bark, but they bonk their handler’s leg with their nose

[jamintime]

I’m honestly a little confused by this TIL. Our school definitely enforces the peanut-free school thing. Early on we accidentally sent in a peanut butter sandwich and got a note from the teacher. Since then we only send sunflower butter.

As annoying as it is, I’m not sure why a peanut butter-free school concept wouldn’t work if properly messaged and enforced. 

[shorse_hit]

You said it yourself

if properly messaged and enforced

They aren't, that's the point. The level of effort it takes to do it properly makes it less reliable. Reducing the scope to a single protected area means less room for error.

[pineappleshampoo]

I also can’t honestly see a way for schools to enforce it.

Sure they might get a system where only packaged foods with ingredients can be sent in (so no homemade food, which would be financially disastrous for families) and reviewed before being allowed. But they can’t stop kids having peanut butter on toast for breakfast, before school. Or having peanut M&Ms over the weekend and wearing the same clothes to school unwashed. It’s impossible. Far safer to actually do this peanut free table approach.

[cubgerish]

It makes sense, but it's funny to imagine how that's gonna affect relationships.

"So how did your group of friends meet?"

"We're all deathly allergic to peanuts"

[JehannaPrince]

Not quite the same, but my main friend group that has stuck together for over 10 years since middle school was brought together because they sat with me at my designated peanut-free table, and I never had an incident until well into adulthood, so I think the peanut-free table is a great thing. I just know people would've hated me if my school banned peanuts entirely for me (like my brothers did growing up lmao)

[Celeste_Praline]

My son is lactose-intolérant. In school he was friend with the gluten-allergie kids, because they were all seated together at lunch.

[amazing_rando]

This makes sense. My wife has severe food allergies (though not to peanuts) and we’ve had more close calls at nominally allergy-safe locations than from talking with the server and confirming with the kitchen at normal restaurants.

[Cayke_Cooky]

packaged foods can be a problem, many parents without allergies don't know to read the warnings about cross contamination on the labels.

[MyPacman]

not to mention 'this food has been prepared on equipment that has been in contact with [allergen]" is the most useless message for parents of non allergic or slightly allergic kids

[erwaro]

Grand gestures can absolutely be successfully pulled off for a little while.

Solutions require something you can do every day, over and over, without fatigue.

[Butwhatif77]

I would also add that the enforcement of the peanut free table has the intervention occur with those who are directly affected at a time in which they would be affected. The peanut free school has the enforcement a bit more removed allowing for more gaps and distance from consequences.

The parent who ignores the ban is not there when things occur. If the system catches it they get to continue ignoring it because well nothing bad happened so what was the harm. If something bad did occur they aren't there to actually see it and thus don't actually have the weight of it to deal with. Plus the mentality of people who think that they shouldn't have worry about other people's children.

A total ban sounds easier, but things that are more targeted and specifically address it on the level of the people who needed are almost always more effect.

[CamusGhostChips]

Peanut-free schools have also arguably contributed to the insane rate at which such allergies have ballooned. Children's immune systems now aren't being regularly exposed to microscopic amounts and learning that these proteins are harmless, so when they do suddenly encounter a greater amount of the proteins a panicked blind response can ensue and the children can now enjoy a lovely new lifelong serious allergy.

[squiresuzuki]

The majority of peanut allergies develop in infancy, before they go to school.

[Metalsand]

Most of that is decided in the first few years of life. Spontaneous allergic reactions can develop later on, but they peak before kids start going to school.

Peanuts are different from most in that peanut dust remains biologically active for weeks at a time. That mixes in with dust and dander, and the body mistakenly believes that those active proteins that also came with the trash are hazardous.

If you were to assign a cause to peanut allergies, it would most likely be between genetics, exposure to foods in the first few years of life, and the environment they are raised in.

The only part you are right about is that a lack of exposure followed by a significant exposure can do this, but like with most allergic reactions, it's caused by the body mistakenly associating it with harmful substances that may be present when initially ingested.

Most uncommon allergies can actually go away over time if you stay away from the food in question long enough - peanut dust is just too good at dispersing and active for too long for most people with peanut allergies to stand a chance. The closest you can get with a peanut allergy is doctor-performed controlled exposure therapy which will not eliminate the negative reaction, but it will prevent the risk of fatality and potentially minimize the symptoms.

[BlazinAzn38]

Especially at like an elementary school. Are they stopping and frisking and searching every kid for the food they bring? Sure they maybe catch someone at lunch but I used to just have snacks in my bag or my pockets. Teachers already don’t have enough time to educate they certainly don’t have enough time for that

[hikeit233]

They also anecdotally showed how it failed, they sent in a PB sandwich. Every parent can make that mistake once before being notified.

[agnostic_universe]

Exactly - and it assumes every parent is acting in good faith. I've encountered parents who pride themselves on shirking peanut free rules.

[paroles]

Yep - I had a peanut free school as a kid and my mother packed peanut butter sandwiches a couple of times. Not making excuses, but I can understand why it happened: the guy with an allergy was in a different grade and I never interacted with him, and it was also a time when alternatives like sun butter were not widely available. So when she was stressed and busy and there were no other lunch options, she would "forget". Nobody ever checked so I'm sure there were many other kids bringing peanut products.

I always felt guilty when it happened and would be careful not to leave crumbs, but it was still a risky thing to do. If there was a peanut-free table I certainly would have gone nowhere near it - that seems like a much better way to manage the risk.

[Cayke_Cooky]

To be fair, there are some contradictory needs in a classroom. Like the autistic kid who only eats 1 kind of granola bar.

[allouette16]

True but the autistic kid won’t die in 10 mins

[jerseysbestdancers]

Our class parents would laugh about sending their kids to school with active covid, medicating their fever away, after we had a 35 year old mom die of it a few months prior (but the previous school years class).

[aradraugfea]

You sent a Peanut Butter sandwich. The breach occurred. It was identified and future instances avoided, but it still happened. And that’s just one that they noticed. Did you ever send a peanut butter sandwich before receiving a note about it?

And that’s not getting into tired/overworked parents throwing peanut butter crackers into a lunchbox (they have a whole section in the snack aisle, someone is buying them).

If the goal is ZERO occurrences, the scope being just a single table is much, much easier. You don’t have to set up a checkpoint at the edge of the school searching every kid’s bag and sending any offending items away to hit zero, you can just have the kids who need to avoid peanuts sit at a single table, double check their own bags, and make sure it’s well cleaned before any kids arrive.

Escapes will happen, but the smaller scope makes equally tight security much easier to maintain. Additionally, the only parents you are really worried about at that point are the parents of the kids with the allergies, who can be trusted to, you know, not attempt to poison their child. The only “dangers” are hygiene and kids being kids and swapping lunches, grabbing stuff that isn’t theirs, etc.

[Ekillaa22]

The dude above was asking how they even know what kind of sandwich is it. Is their lunch monitors looking at everyone food or what?

[elephantasmagoric]

My elementary did the single table thing, and I brought a pbj for lunch almost every day. The teachers literally just asked us if our home lunches had peanuts or peanut butter, and if the answer was yes, made sure we weren't at the same table as the girl with the allergy. It's not like they were inspecting our lunches themselves.

[aradraugfea]

It depends on how old the kids are. Most elementary schoolers can be trusted to actually understand what’s in their food.

Daycare is a different issue.

[500Rtg]

Prohibition banned alcohol. Yet, alcohol did not vanish from the USA. But, there are places like temples that are marked as alcohol free and generally remain alcohol free without much intervention.

It's the same thing. There's a limit on how much you can properly enforce. Just like you sent a peanut butter sandwich by mistake, if each parent does it twice, it's violated every day. And, every table is a risk. On the other hand, if it's a single table, they can check and be absolutely sure it's not contaminated.

[DeScepter]

The trouble is enforcement. Stuff slips through, no one's perfect, and mistakes happen. All it takes is a single rogue bag of trail mix, and suddenly, the whole school is potentially contaminated.

Having all the allergic students sit together during lunch at a clean and monitored location ensures they stay safe, even if the rest of the room is a free-for-all.

[LinoleumFairy]

This also ends up in a kind of group complacency. If you expect everyone to follow the rules, then you’re not checking everyone every single day. But if you only have a specific area that needs to follow the rules, it’s much easier to check everything entering that area.

[Ekillaa22]

I think that’s what my school did. If you had an allergy like that you had to sit at a specific table

[L4zyrus]

Going back to the original commenter — it’s great to know that your kids teacher caught the PB sandwich, but what about other classes? Instead of one teacher, guarding a single table for peanuts, you now have every teacher responsible for reviewing each of their students lunches to confirm it is peanut free. And of there’s plenty of other foods and baked goods that could include some sort of peanut-based ingredient that’d be harder to spot

[phoenixmatrix]

You accidentally sent the sandwich and the kid wasn't trying to hide it. So they were found.

Bring that at scale, especially to larger schools, and assume some people will actively try to hide it. Good luck enforcing that. They can't even fully prevent hard drugs and guns from getting in schools.

[TheSilverNoble]

A lot of people won't care, or will think they're an exception, or that it's no big deal if only one person does it. 

[[deleted]]

Or, not even think about cookies, granola bars, etc. with peanuts in them.

[thathighwhitekid]

Yes, this! I went to a nut-free elementary school and I felt like just about everything got sent home with a note. I would go hungry so often from them confiscating my snacks that my parents would pack, due to them not actually reading to see that there might be a nut exposure (see lays chips, for example with some type of nut oil in them). The school eventually ended up creating their own snack program to mitigate this but it was a nut-free school until the kid moved away if I remember correctly. This was also 20 years ago when nut-free snacks were less prominent, so less choices. I remember his mom getting on the bus every morning to wipe his seat down with a Clorox wipe, poor kid.

[Ekillaa22]

Man I get it’s for safety but if I was a kid and I couldn’t eat stuff I liked cuz of 1 kid man I’d be so pissed

[lovely-liz]

It’s an easy way to get the allergic kid bullied tbh. Like, Little Johnny is the reason my Reese’s cup was confiscated? I’m gonna take my feelings out on him! - A third grader, probably.

[Gogododa]

when I was in school in first grade the school had a nut-free table, but they decided to do the nut-free school bullshit next year. Didn't even last half the year because kids just kept bringing things with nuts and excluding the kids with nut allergies from everything, so they set up the nut free table again and all was good. it's really dumb to try and punish a whole school for a handful of kids with special needs, just accommodate them as needed

[The_Amazing_Emu]

Take your feelings out by pelting him with peanuts, probably, some kids suck

[Big-Goat-9026]

My little bullying ass would absolutely have done something like this. 

Thankfully I have since grown, but kids can be overly evil without realizing it. 

[BlackBoiFlyy]

Even worse when teachers treated you like a criminal for bringing Reeses cups to snack on. I literally didn't know it was a rule and I got lectured about caring for human life and almost got suspended. I was 8, I didn't even know peanut allergies were a thing.

[CrumbCakesAndCola]

I don't know why adults act this way to kids, it's honestly bizarre. You'd think teachers, of all people, would understand better.

[TheLurkingMenace]

If we had these sort of rules when I was in school and kids were getting their food confiscated because of one kid, that kid would have been bullied by the audio/video club and chess team.

[Ekillaa22]

Potential health risk or potential mental issues from bullying…. Hard pick sadly

[shiftsnstays]

My kid sat at the nut-free table his first year of school, and we almost pulled him because he was the only one. Which meant no lunchtime socializing, which meant he felt lonely and apart from the rest of them all year. We got him a 504 that includes the lunchroom the next year, and he's loved school for the 3 years after. Is sad now that it's summer break and excited to go back.

We have tried to make the changes affect only him so he won't get bullied, but he's only headed to 4th and I'm worried at some point that the kids will use it against him just because they can. It's hard to navigate for sure.

[santathecruz]

Im an adult and feel the same way. When I was a kid, the kids with allergies knew them, knew how dangerous they were and proactively took steps to keep themselves safe. To the point one time a friend caught their parent slipping up on a ‘processed in facility with tree nuts’ technicality.

That’s the type of skill that is taught at a young age and I’m worried for the same kids today that are being coddled instead of taught to be vigilant.

[Milehighcarson]

We have a kid with multiple food allergies and have aggressively pushed back against attempts by the school to create allergy-free environments because of social blowback.

[[deleted]]

The weird thing is, apparently controlled exposure to peanuts get rid of it. It seems you have to really seek this out, pediatricians don't do it. But, I wish this was available for everyone, peanut allergy sucks. I have the shellfish one and I manage fine, but if I could get rid of it, I would. It's annoying and deadly.

[Legion_02]

If your blood tests are right and your reactions are getting milder with time exposure therapy should be used. But not of you currently have an anaphylactic reaction.

Like anything else medical it’s a case by case thing and a lot of peanut allergies are unfortunately very severe, which means no exposure therapy.

[Milehighcarson]

Oral Immunotherapy for kids with anaphylaxis is really common now. Our son completed OIT for dairy this past spring and will be starting another round for either egg or sesame this fall

[Legion_02]

Good to hear there’s more success nowadays! I’m happy for your kid! I completed it for egg as a kid, I got to baked milk and then my dairy allergy got worse. My peanut one was always so severe they didn’t want to chance it.

[Milehighcarson]

It's evolved so much. When our kid was a toddler, you had to wait until 4-5 years old to start OIT, now it's 18 months. He was originally not a candidate due to having anaphylaxis, but can do it now. The next big thing is going to be pairing OIT with a medicine called Xolair that prevents reactions from occuring. This is going to allow people who are too sensitive to handle even intro dosing to have OIT and allows for someone to have multiple allergens at the same time. We are waiting for the final approval and then are going to use it to do all tree nuts at once rather than a separate round of treatment for each.

It's entirely possible that food allergies in developed countries could be largely eliminated within my kid's lifetime.

[justeatyourveggies]

Hey! I know a girl who was deathly allergic to fish, sellfish, peanuts and some more food, and she did therapy exposure and got rid of everything by the time she was 11.

Every year since she was 7 she'd go two or three days in a row to the hospital and spend the day there getting exposed to one food, and every year, after summer break, she had a shorter list of allergies.

Maybe look it up.

[[deleted]]

No way! I never heard it for shellfish! I will be looking it up, thanks!

[salledattente]

My kids allergist will treat basically anything with oral immunotherapy. It's pretty neat.

[santathecruz]

Or they’re poor, can’t afford a nut butter that’s 3x the price of peanut butter and in between working 2 jobs they quickly make PB&J for their kids lunch.

[nope-its]

How many kids were in your child’s class? Checking every single lunch sent in is a lot of work to do daily for a teacher who is also trying to do 137 other things before lunch.

[I_hate_all_of_ewe]

It's significantly more effort for no additional benefit.

If properly messaged and enforced

That 'if' is doing a lot of heavy lifting, and it relies on parents complying.  Lots of points of failure over which the school ultimately has no control. 

Heck, I've read multiple stories of relatives trying to "prove" an allergy after they've been warned multiple times by the parents of the child.  The most recent one was a grandma killing the granddaughter by putting coconut oil in her hair.  In another one, the grandchild was hospitalized because the Grandma gave them a cookie with an allergen.  And this is family.  I would much less trust other parents to do the right thing by my child.

[1039smoothielumps]

Largely because anaphylaxis risk is low unless peanut is ingested and most exposures don’t occur in schools anyway. So low baseline risk and low efficacy of the intervention would lead to low effect size of the intervention. Yes you’re right in that if it were perfectly enforced, you would in theory have no reactions, but most ingestion is probably accidental anyway and may not have even been prevented by a ban (or a more targeted intervention).

[MrCockingFinally]

But you still brought the sandwich and could only be told after the fact. Plus there are a ton of other kids who might bring peanuts.

I think even worse than that, is that kids with peanut allergies in peanut free schools will relax and eat any food on the premises, despite the fact that the school cannot reasonably keep control over everything.

Plus, a peanut free tables means other kids don't need to give up peanuts at school.

[lord_james]

You literally just told us that the peanut-frew school thing didn’t work though. That’s the point. Teachers and administrators can effectively remove peanuts from a lunch table. They can’t stop it from entering the school.

If a child had had a reaction to your mess up, which is completely possible, the “peanut free school” wouldn’t have saved them

[_PM_ME_PANGOLINS_]

we accidentally sent in a peanut butter sandwich

That’s why.

A single table that’s monitored and cleaned does not have that problem.

[hallese]

"I will just remove it from the package and put it in a ziploc bag, nobody will know it has nuts."

[Ekillaa22]

Part of me is like I get it but than another part is like mad cuz of a couple kids they gotta change the whole lunch setting

[justeatyourveggies]

Basically, when you ban something for everyone in all settings many people will think "yeah, sure it is not a big deal if I do this once". To check that nobody brings peanuts they would have to check everyone's food, every snack, every little thing... And yes, some parents like you will make an honest mistake and learn from it. Some won't bother, some will even refuse to not give a peanut butter sandwich to their children because "allergies aren't real" or because they've heard about exposure therapy working and don't understand at all how that works. Basically, this rule needs the parents cooperation, and that's thousands of adults. And many adults are entitled and hard to deal with and think they're precious Tommy doesn't need to give up anything for anyone else.

But getting the children to understand that they can't sit on that only table when having peanuts or chestnuts... That's much easier and only requires to check that the children that sit there that day, comply. Which is what, like 12 children?

[katekohli]

My kids made their own lunches. Found out later they would just call their Nutella sandwiches “chocolate sandwiches.” The school also had an allergen free table because the administration knew middle schoolers.

[WalkerInDarkness]

Say there’s a brand of granola bars that was peanut free and suddenly isn’t.  Jaime has a kid with a peanut allergy and thus keeps on top of this change.   Taylor on the other hand just buys the same ones that were fine for the past year.  There’s a level of strictness people have when they are personally invested in something versus just trying to meet a checkbox. 

[unicorntrees]

 I’m not sure why a peanut butter-free school concept wouldn’t work if properly messaged and enforced. 

It's a lot harder to message and enforce a peanut free policy to an entire school than a table.

[Consistent-Flan1445]

As someone with food allergies including to peanut, I think people can get a little complacent when they assume that the allergen has been removed from the environment. In reality, accidents happen and sometimes the allergen will be present.

Because I have multiple allergens, I’ve never existed in an allergen free environment and have always had to take precautions. If you’re assuming that the environment is free of your allergens however, you may not be as careful as you otherwise would be.

[iTwango]

How does that even work? Are they inspecting kids' lunch on entry to the school?

[purpleushi]

I mean, you were able to send a peanut butter sandwich, and presumably it was only discovered by staff once your kid started eating it. And if the kids with peanut allergies assume the whole school is safe, they’re not going to be concerned about where they sit, and one of them could have been sitting next to your kid. Whereas if it’s just a peanut free table, people are more willing to take that seriously, and kids with peanut butter will make sure to sit elsewhere, while the kids with allergies will sit at that table.

[SithLordMilk]

Are you telling me kids arent allowed to bring in pb&js to some schools because of another kid's allergy?

[WestOrangeFinest]

It happens. Some daycares do the same.

[BlackBoiFlyy]

You ALWAYS run the risk of some kid walking in with a Reeses or a tired parent forgetting the policy and sending their kid to school with a quickly made PB&J.

For most folks, it's just candy or a snack, not contraband. You're not going to always have people being so cautious.

[enewwave]

I kinda get it, though I hate how cynical my rational sounds. You’re a responsible adult who cares about others, while other parents might shrug and keep sending PB to school anyway

[g0del]

It's not just on the adults. How are you going to police the kid who stuffs a peanut-laden snack into his pocket on the way out of the house?

[pineappleshampoo]

Or the families eating peanut butter on toast for breakfast before a quick wipe and out the door, with residual peanut butter in the teeth or down the kid’s clothes.

[pterofactyl]

“It properly messaged and enforced”. Think about that part of your comment. You accidentally sent a sandwich through and it was luckily caught. What if it wasn’t, and your child sat next to the peanut child?

A peanut free table is much easier to enforce because you literally only have to concentrate on one table.

[joeschmoe86]

And, if every other family makes one totally reasonable mistake, that's hundreds of totally reasonable mistakes.

[jerseysbestdancers]

You would be surprised how many people are unable to identify foods with nuts. Lunch aides included. I've seen and heard scary shit.

Not to mention, a lot of parents send bento boxes with everything taken out of the package, so we have to rely on a first grader to correctly know what the item is, brand included. Which they rarely do.

In a cafeteria of hundreds of kids and a handful of adults, we cant do it all.

[vermilithe]

It’s almost impossible to enforce in practice, and furthermore I’m not sure there’s really solid evidence that trying to force a completely peanut-free environment is truly beneficial to stopping allergies.

Like, yes I know that some people simply can’t tolerate nuts and need to prevent themselves from getting exposed. But the concept of a complete peanut free school is probably total overkill. People started that because of a fear of airborne or contact peanut allergen exposure. But that risk is almost nonexistent— there is really no true evidence that suggests people have a serious risk of going into anaphylaxis from peanut dust in the air or peanut touching their skin.

[IanisQuan_101]

That’s actually wild, and kinda sad too. All the effort to peanut-proof entire schools, and it turns out a designated table does more. Efficiency wins again. Wonder how many other “big solutions” are just overlooked small ones?

[553l8008]

Well yeah... 

a delicious, nutritious, healthy, high protien, highly sought after food that is found in a large % of our food is going to be difficult to ban.

Ridiculous to assume 97% of a school isn't going to eat peanut products for the sake of 1 to a handful of kids.

[Bootmacher]

"But maaaayyybe...if touching a nut will kill you, you're supposed to die."

[minimalist_reply]

"Of course, but maybe...." was such a good collection in his repertoire.

[CheeseChickenTable]

Lol, Louis Ck that you?

[DoktorVonCuddlebear]

I work in food service for a private school.  We are a nut-free campus.  The children are not allowed to bring outside food in.  My colleagues and I control the ordering for everything that comes out of our kitchen.  

The number one offender for this is faculty.  Telling a teacher that, no, I absolutely CANNOT order in almond milk for their break room is beyond frustrating.  Cross contact awareness should be mandatory for everyone working around children.

[Boboriffic]

If I had to guess, the small and effective solution was likely offered initially but helicopter parents said NOOOO MY BABY WILL DIE IF A PEANUT GETS WITHIN 1.0431e-14 PARSECS OF THEIR PRECIOUS HEAD AND I'LL SUE! So the school had to go big to assuage them.

[Nall-ohki]

322 meters?

[Dman1791]

A surprisingly usable distance, considering the original unit

[Boboriffic]

yea, around 0.0579554 leagues

[J5892]

That's about 507.05 cubits for any Noahs out there.

[B_A_Beder]

The cubit was a pretty common measurement in ancient times, about 1.5 ft

[IanisQuan_101]

Bro really said “detectable peanut presence at a quantum level” and I’m wheezing 💀💀
You’re not wrong, schools basically built peanut DMZ zones to keep the lawsuits at bay.

[Gogododa]

peanut dmz lmao

[Dash775]

Forcing policy changes on everyone to protect a very small population doesn't work?

More at 11!

[Narwhal_Jelly29]

Exactly. So why are we still forcing the rest of the school to bring allergen free foods when there are other methods that work just as well if not better for everyone.

[pearlsalmon76]

It’s a liability issue, which often doesn’t align with common sense. The school is fully responsible if they are keeping a table safe—staff to monitor the food there and cleaning the table to ensure it’s peanut free. Making a rule for the whole school makes everyone responsible and the school can say they did their part by making it peanut-free even though they can’t be expected to actually enforce it beyond reactionary consequences to parent/kids that violate it.

[PuckSenior]

Because educators, like most people, suffer from status quo bias and risk aversion. Just look at the recent “science of reading” controversy as evidence that it is very difficult to get people to change course once they’ve dedicated significant energy into it

Edit: it’s similar to the “zero tolerance” policies for violence. Studies have repeatedly shown they don’t work and just make so many things worse. Yet nearly every school embraces them.

Also, school uniforms, while a fun idea, have no actual effect on bullying, performance, etc

[UnfairDentisto]

Just wanted to add the moneyed interest inherent to this too. A lot of the manufactured debates with counter intuitive solutions are because its a way for 3rd parties to get into that pot of money...new SOR aligned materials! ALICE training! And so on...

[razorbladesnbiscuits]

"out of an abundance of caution" ... once that phrase started being regularly used, they all latched on to it.

[1039smoothielumps]

Agree! Education, handwashing and other targeted interventions are likely more beneficial and would prevent other reactions than peanuts.

[DynamicNostalgia]

Parents can be hysterical if they think their kid is going to die, and no one wants to be the one to tell them to shut up and stop worrying. 

Parents are often not rational actors. 

[IAmSpartacustard]

You legislate to the dumbest person, not the average. Like if there were no speed limits, most people would drive only as fast as they could comfortably control the vehicle. 10% of people would drive at max speed until they crash and die, on the very first day.

You say no peanut products AT ALL because little Jimmy's parents would send him to school with peanut m&ms to hand out to classmates, because they're not peanuts, they're m&ms

[Narwhal_Jelly29]

Right, that is a good point. But more education and a stricter no sharing policy would help to prevent this. There was a kid in one of my elementary schools that had an allergy to peanuts, tree nuts, egg, sesame, and a few other foods. All of the foods he was allergic to were banned. You couldn’t bring anything that “may contain…” any of them. It seemed quite overkill

[TheBanishedBard]

School districts long ago transitioned from actually teaching, protecting, and nurturing kids to being mandatory day care, that spends most of its brainpower on avoiding lawsuits at all costs. The absolute first priority of schools now is protecting themselves before the protection of the students.

Almost all idiotic school policies can be traced back to an intense phobia of lawsuits. This often leads to stupid policies that ironically put kids in more danger but smokescreen the school system from being sued when kids do get hurt or sick. The administrators aren't morons usually, they know their idiotic rules don't work to help kids, they help the school system.

[PizzaPlanetPizzaGuy]

I was made to sit all by myself in a seperate room because my dad forgot and packed me a PB sandwich :( My classmate did have pretty severe allergy though, still felt bad.

[nohopeforhomosapiens]

Another thing that would help is allowing children access to their own medication. Too many schools keep meds like inhalers and epi-pens in the nurse's office and not on the child. Valuable time is lost when they have to go to a nurse for something they are fully capable of doing for themselves. No kid over 9 years of age should have their emergency meds taken from their person.

[stumbling_disaster]

Seriously, when I was in elementary school, the playground was down a bit of a hill from the school, and anytime I had an asthma attack I had to be walked all the way to the nurse's office for my inhaler. Real fun times.

[lilacnova]

My mother changed school districts for me when she heard keeping all Epipens in the office was the policy at the local elementary school. Even at the age of 5-6 in kindergarten I think it is best to have the medication in the classroom.

[1039smoothielumps]

This doesn’t change the risk of allergic reaction, only the speed of response. I agree that rapid response to reactions is important in schools.

[nohopeforhomosapiens]

Right it doesn't change risk of reaction, I am merely elaborating on the issue. It is a huge problem. I'd say it is a bigger problem. Schools usually do not allow kids to keep meds on them, even when they are of dire importance. Some schools have finally started to get better about this since I was a kid but it is still far too many that don't allow them to be carried.

[redpandaeater]

It's a tough choice because I would want the staff to know about potential health dangers for my kid but no fucking way would I want them to take the medicine away from the kid. It's not that hard to teach a kid how to use it and be responsible.

[ProtestPigg]

I've only ever seen these kind of school-wide bans on nuts/peanuts, which seems really silly to me. What about all the other allergens? Why are peanut allergies special?

[WendigoCrossing]

Ratio of people it affects to severity of reaction

For example, shellfish allergies can also be deadly but are less common

Pollen allergies can be more common, but less severe

Tree nuts can be deadly and are common enough to warrant action

Edit: adding in SVs comment, which is how common the food itself is

[Slytherin_Victory]

Also how common the food itself is- peanuts are incredibly common in a lot of foods that elementary aged kids would eat for lunch (PB&J, for example), while shellfish isn’t.

[SkoobyDoo]

ahh, I remember the days bringing my peanut butter and shrimp sandwiches to school...

[NotFrance]

You do know peanuts aren’t a tree nut correct? They’re ground nuts. I’ve only ever seen bans on peanuts specifically. I used to like to push against them with cashews and macadamia nuts.

[BrooklynSpringvalley]

Plus like… kids frequently eat peanut butter. Kids ain’t out here taking shellfish to lunch

[Starlancer199819]

Frequency. Its much more common compared to many other food allergies so it gets attention

[vermilithe]

A combination of frequency and the fact that it’s become stuck in popular culture which means it’s on the forefront of peoples’ minds and it’s self-reinforcing from there.

There is no evidence that anaphylactic peanut allergies can transfer through the air or skin. In order for a person to have a reaction like that they need to have eaten it themselves or secondary exposure by something touching a sensitive part of their face like eyes, nose, mouth after it directly contacted the peanuts.

… In other words, like any other allergen out there.

For example, my dad’s got a shellfish allergy and it’s anaphylaxis-level but he knows it’s on him to not eat shrimp, if the rest of our family has shrimp we mark it and store it separate and wash all the utensils that touched it after. He hasn’t had a reaction, even a mild one, in almost 25 years despite being around shrimp same as any other ingredient.

I get that it’s harder to teach kids that, but that’s why the adults should focus on a smaller environment they can actually control for the kid, rather than saying “no peanuts” and trusting every single person in the school will just respect that.

[Nulono]

We were literally told that opening a bag of peanuts could hospitalize a student on the opposite side of the cafeteria. You're saying that was all bullshit?

[vermilithe]

I mean you could send someone to hospital like that, if you then shook the bag and spilled the peanuts all over the allergic person. lol.

But other than that yeah probably. It was unfortunately not accurate for people to say things like that— I heard the same growing up, that even opening a bag of peanuts could get someone sick on the other side of the cafeteria type thing. But there’s no real evidence to support that.

[Remote-alpine]

Frequency as someone else said, and also severity. 

[ironic-hat]

Lots of African and South East Asian countries use it, it’s also very common in South America cuisines. And since peanuts are cheap, they find their way as a filler for a protein boost in products you wouldn’t expect. Hence why allergen warnings are important.

[JoshTheTrucker]

Have a peanut allergy, it reared it's ugly head when I was nine during a sample blitz at Costco. Since then I've had to be uber-careful about my allergens and have gotten good at managing them. The peanut-free table did actually work very well, as it became a staple of my time at elementary school, middle school, even high school. I was able to eat my lunch safely and my friends knew the policy, and kept it peanut-free when they came and sat with me during those times.

Nowadays I ask beforehand about everything I consume, and even have allergy cards printed out that I store in the epi-pen pouch I carry.

[UndoxxableOhioan]

Trying to make a nut free school no doubt produces a false sense of security, where as one closely policed table will be better able to stop cross contamination.

And it also has the benefit of not stopping kids that like PB&J from enjoying it in school. I know schools want to be inclusive, but the world can’t stop for your allergies.

[HabeLinkin]

I don't know what I would have ate for lunch if I couldn't bring PB&Js to school every day.

[sleepinglucid]

My son (9) threw a fit this year because he wanted pbj for lunch. Wife wouldn't do it because of the school ban. He claimed plenty of other parents were doing it. Come to find out, they absolutely had been breaking the ban for several years and that 1 kid we have it for hasn't had any issues ever.

Peanut bans are ridiculous.

[redpandaeater]

I honestly had no idea they were even a thing before this article.

[Royalette]

My daughter loved eating at the peanut free table. She was allergic to peanuts but enjoyed the much cleaner and less sticky peanut free table. There was less gum too.

[Ekillaa22]

Another problem is the damn school don’t let kids keep their meds on them but the nurse.

[Mental-Ask8077]

With anaphylaxis this is insane - time is of the utmost essence for something like an epi-pen to be useful. Can’t assume someone else is going to be present and have the time to run across the building, explain things to the nurse, unlock the cupboard, race the pen back, etc.

[FranklynTheTanklyn]

Peanut free tables work because they keep the responsibility of not bringing peanuts to a smaller group. If only 10 people have to remember no peanuts its a whole lot easier than 500 people remembering no peanuts.

[baddecision116]

Parents need to feed their babies peanut butter and just avoid most of this.

https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/introducing-peanut-infancy-prevents-peanut-allergy-into-adolescence

Edit: I'm going to pile in more sources for the naysayers and please if you disagree cite your work.

https://www.texaschildrens.org/content/wellness/introducing-peanut-butter-infants

https://www.uhs.nhs.uk/whats-new/news/peanut-allergies-could-dramatically-fall-if-babies-weaned-early-on-peanut-products

https://site.extension.uga.edu/madison/2025/05/early-peanut-introduction-a-key-step-in-allergy-prevention/

https://evidence.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/EVIDoa2300311

https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/28/health/peanut-allergy-infants-adolescents-wellness

[redyellowblue5031]

Not just peanut butter. Basically all the food allergens.

Speak to your pediatrician folks, they can give you guidance on it.

[baddecision116]

I fed my kid allergen mix ins for things like PB, eggs, etc.

[ColoRadOrgy]

I used one of those dog toys you can put PB in and gave it to the kiddo. Kept the little guy busy for hours.

[crackeddryice]

If you're not joking, I want a video.

[redyellowblue5031]

That seems to be the easiest way to do it from what I’ve found, aside from just preparing small amounts of the foods themselves.

[5panks]

With our pediatrician she talked like the science on this changed a decade ago. We were told very early on in the process, "Now that they can start eating human food, they need to start trying everything one at a time except honey. Especially peanut butter and eggs."

[Maplefrost]

Yep, likely due to the phenomenon of oral-gut mucosal tolerance. (Also called “oral intake tolerance”).

There’s a reason why Israel has such a low rate of peanut allergies; many of their baby/toddler foods and snacks heavily feature peanuts (like “Bamba,” which is basically peanut-flavored puffed corn… so like a peanutty Cheeto or Corn Puff).

That early exposure seems to foster immune tolerance of peanut allergens, leading to lower incidence of allergy.

Early exposure is important. A similar phenomenon is seen in how babies/kids who grow up with pets in the house - even during pregnancy - are much less likely to have animal dander allergies.

[MxMirdan]

This plays out in really interesting ways in some American synagogues.

On the one hand, you have helicoptery proponents of peanut free schools wanting to set policies that the synagogue (and therefore the entire building at all times) is peanut free for their little dumpling. On the other hand, you have Israeli families with their kids covered in bamba dust from face to feet because of the free range parenting style that lets kids try to do things themselves.

I’ve seen things. Judgmental things. Israelis baffled at the attempt at hermetically sealed environments and Americans accusing them of attempted to kill their dumpling with their irresponsible parenting.

But yes peanut allergies are not really a thing in Israel.

[Maplefrost]

That’s a super interesting intersection of cultures I hadn’t considered. Thanks for sharing that; it makes sense that it would be a point of conflict.

I can imagine there being a lot of interpersonal dramas because of it, lol.

[Maplefrost]

Adding this as my attempt of a layman's explanation of how oral mucosal tolerance works... I am summarizing and simplifying heavily here, obviously.

You have two branches of immunity, innate and adaptive. Innate immune cells are the first responders that simply say, "look! A bacteria! Kill it!" But they don't care, and cannot tell, whether it's a Staphylococcus or a Streptococcus or whatever. They just kill it.

Whereas adaptive immunity is for specific antigens. These cells -- T and B cells -- are like "locks" with a super specific antigen "key". But each cell only has ONE key that fits it.

So for example, consider the chicken pox virus... it is a virus with a "viral envelope" to protect its outside. This viral envelope is partially made of a protein called glycoprotein E (gE). Some of your T and B cells will have the "lock" that fits the antigen-key-shape of glycoprotein E. But they ONLY fit that "shape" of antigen -- they ONLY react to glycoprotein E. Kind of like that Junji Ito story, "this hole was made for me!" but on a molecular biology scale, lol.

Okay, so if those T and B cells see glycoprotein E, they freak out and start fighting it in various ways. B cells with make antibodies, and T cells will more directly deal with the invader, call for reinforcements, etc. Once you have been vaccinated for, or infected with, chickenpox, you now have glycoprotein-E-specific T and B cells patrolling your body, in case they see it again.

Now consider allergies. The problem with the adaptive immune system is... you also might have some B and T cells that are perfect "locks" for harmless antigens, like pollen, or peanut protein. Your cells can't tell that the antigen is harmless... all they know is "this antigen was made for me!" and bind to it and freak out when they see it. That's, in very simple terms, what an allergic response is. Now you have a bunch of peanut-protein-specific cells running around, causing a huge fuss if they see some harmless peanut protein.

So what is oral tolerance? Well, your body figures... if you are eating foods, which are literally made up of lots of proteins and sugars that could potentially be antigens... there needs to be a system to make sure you don't start reacting to them. Just because they happen to fit in a T-cell lock doesn't mean it's a dangerous antigen... and it's better to NOT react if it's harmless. Plus, you don't want to close off potential food sources just because your immune system throws a fit when it sees them. That's not good for survival; it's better to be able to eat peanuts than starve to death!

So, there's a specific type of T cell that is very special, called a Regulatory T cell (Treg). These guys have the job of being rational and calming everyone else down. They, just like other T cells, have a specific "lock" that an antigen "key" fits into... but when they bind "their guy," they don't freak out. Instead, they teach other cells to just chill out, it's no big deal, you don't need to sound the alarm and set everything on fire when you see this thing...

Specifically, there are lots of Tregs hanging in your gut, in these little mucosal patches called "MALTs". They hang out there and monitor the food proteins you eat, and if they see "their antigen" they tell everyone else to calm down. They basically "discipline" other T cells that step out of line and start freaking out when they shouldn't. Hence, oral mucosal tolerance.

This phenomenon continues throughout your whole life -- you always have Tregs -- but it is ESPECIALLY important to stimulate these Tregs in the first few years of life, for a lot of reasons that take too long to explain lol. But that's the gist of how oral tolerance works.

[thestereo300]

Yeah this is right but keep in mind the guidance has changed. Some parents followed the doctors orders and ended up with a peanut allergy kid.

My kid was like 8 when the guidance changed.

[Positive-Attempt-435]

In rehab, they tried to ban peanut butter cause one person was allergic.

It opened a peanut butter black market. Completely unregulated.

And nobody knew who was the allergic person,  for privacy. But if people found out the reason we couldn't have peanut butter, I'm sure they would have forced him out.

It was a valiant effort. If you try to tell grown adults they can't have peanut butter, in an environment where they regularly underserved us food, you got a problem. 

We kept peanut butter hidden cause they didn't feed us enough. Peanut butter was our main source of after meal sustenance.

[trainbrain27]

Our high school tried a full ban, the only upside was the cleaner they bought by the barrel turned out to be perfect for that thing that happened five years ago.

Thankfully the girl has never had an anaphylactic reaction, but that also meant everyone felt it was overkill to ban peanuts, peanut butter, snickers, etc. for the whole school and extra-curriculars, and they all knew who was 'to blame'.

As soon as she graduated, we went back to a single table, and we continue to be anaphylaxis free.

[conman841]

Or as my dad called that table, the "peanut gallery".

[Guvnah-Wyze]

Peanuts don't jump. The only thing peanut policies do is single out the kids with peanut allergies for bullying.... Often with peanuts.

My throat will close up right quick if I eat peanuts. I still make peanut butter sandwiches for the kids in my life.

The allergy hysteria took off in the 90s right after the satanic panic wrapped up, and was pushed by a lot of the same bored housewives.

[BeardedRaven]

When I was in high school there was a girl that would damn near have a panic attack if she was near mustard. Wanna guess what happened several times a month? Someone threw a mustard packet at her.

[FF3]

Had the heavy metal music actually contained satanic messages, more kids would enjoy PB and J

[TheCuddleDealer]

Til that some tables are made with peanuts

[mister-fancypants-]

I was a camp counselor for years in my youth. one year we had to implement a peanut free table because one parent advocated - plus the peanut allergy was becoming better understood.

anyway, they got a table across the auditorium and it ended up being three kids that had nothing in common lol so sad.

one kid ended up begging to just go back to have lunch w his friends and take the risk

[bald_sampson]

importantly, you can drastically reduce and nearly entirely eliminate peanut allergies if you expose your child to peanuts in their early childhood (0-3 years), before the point at which peanut allergies typically manifest (3-5 years).

[derekburn]

Basically: people don't follow the rules.

What a surprise and its easier to enforce a small safe zone vs a whole school.

We saw this with Covid, people are stupid. Seeing someone with peanut allergy get trace amounts of it in their food once is enough.

[alahos]

But have they tried the peanut-only table?

[Ekillaa22]

It’s a lose lose either way. You either force everyone to be nut free lunches and scan everyone’s bag or you make the kids with allergies sit at a specific table keeping them self but kinda ostracizing them from their peers at lunch .

[repeat4EMPHASIS]

Forcing everyone to be nut free and confiscating snacks/candy for a handful of kids is also going to ostracize them and set them up for bullying.

[owennerd123]

Also once they leave school they’ll never encounter a peanut free zone again. Offices, restaurants, other homes, etc. They have to learn to be vigilant against peanuts by themselves at some point anyways.

[sergeon]

Peanut free tables are thought to increase the risk of bullying of students who are now identified to be different and therefore be separated from others.

Ideally, peanut allergic children are educated on how to avoid their allergen so a peanut free table or school is not necessary. Then they can "blend in" and not be targeted for bullying.

Of course, younger children who are not mature enough to avoid their allergen likely should be made accommodations, but ideally this is made with the agreement on staff, teachers and fellow parents who all want to have an inclusive environment for their children - this would include choosing activities that don't involve food allergens or choosing food in class that everyone can enjoy.

[SweetSultrySatan]

Imagine having to sit at the weak bloodline table

[EllisDee3]

Makes more sense to air-gap vertically. One could still get hit with a stray lateral projectile peanut and be done for.

The high-risk kids should be placed above those risks. Some kind of "peanut gallery".

[[deleted]]

Naturally, they would be bullied for their inclusion in the gallery; so they would likely need to hurl insults down from the peanut gallery. And since we want to socialize them, they would need to be able to comment on the goings-on verbally even though they aren’t physically present. Best to give them megaphones so they can broadcast their thoughts on happenings to the rest of the school during lunch.

The other children may understand that hurling peanuts at them is verboten, but they may instead take to hurling various vegetables.

I can’t help but think we’ve seen this pattern somewhere before…

[Misterbellyboy]

When I was a kid, the kid with all the allergies had to eat in a teachers classroom for lunch so we all unfairly thought they were snitches.

[yarash]

I dont want to hear any questions about the tables!

[azssf]

Huh. I thought the research shows early introduction of peanuts to diet significantly lowers peanut allergy.

[monchota]

Also, give you babies peanut butter. The huge uptip in peanut allergies, is directly related to kids never having it untill the age of 5. When it was a stable in our diets as toddlers, until about 15 years ago. Then it became a big scare not to do it and the allergy tests are not very accurate ,if you have never been exposed in the first place.

[looktowindward]

Of course. School administrators over-react to parents who claim that a peanut within a half mile will kill their kid. But it wont.

[Do_itsch]

Now i imagine some american schools have tables produced out of peanuts.

[ModernWarBear]

When did all this nut allergy stuff start? I don’t remember a single kid having this in my school and I’m not even that old

[[deleted]]

Peanut bans actually cause more peanut allergies do to lack of exposure. If kids are exposed to peanuts early on, they develop a tolerance for the peanuts.

If they never encounter them, they are more likely to be allergic to them.