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Woman with severe allergy ‘left with no choice’ but to buy every packet of peanuts on flight
(www.independent.co.uk)
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this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
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I feel bad for her but I have to wonder, how does this person function on a day to day basis? If their allergy is so severe that other people eating peanuts around her would harm her, how does she leave the house? How did she navigate the airport?
Yeah exactly, if her allergy was that severe - which it evidently was not, see the comment by Eurowings about a general buildup due to the nature of airplane flight and airplane in-air circulation and she survivedt hat - then she would naturally not be flying commercial. There'd be no way to do that without immediately triggering her allergy.
Not only that, but did she handle the packages of nuts after purchase? Because if she did, she came into contact with an absolute shit ton of nut particles, and would have had a reaction.
Don't take health advice from Zoidberg
It is your fault for being human.
Also wouldn’t there still be shit in the air and on surfaces from the previous flight where everyone enjoyed their peanuts?
Peanuts are not ubiquitous in public. Being near several people eating them in a fairly enclosed space is very different than walking through and airport and someone 25 feet away has a bag of peanuts.
The air within an airplane cabin is recirculated every five or ten minutes. A real severe peanut allergy would be triggered by anyone on the plane eating peanuts.
are planes cleansed that thoroughly between flights? I assume one would have to worry about who was eating what in the area from a previous flight with an allergy that severe
No, they are not.
The majority of airplanes are equipped with HEPA filters. As in, removing 99,97% of particles over 0.3 micron in size. The unfiltered air is fed in from the outside. It's pretty clean and not a consideration for allergens like peanut particles.
Source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/how-clean-is-the-air-on-your-airplane-coronavirus-cvd
HEPA filters remove 99.97% of particles that are 0.3 micron in size. (That is the size of particles they're tested with, as it's the most difficult to filter.) They remove over 99.97% of particles larger or smaller than 0.3 microns.
Living with allergies such as a severe peanut allergy is all about mitigating risk
In most open areas you can be cautious about what you touch and who you stand near to. In enclosed spaces such as airplanes, the risk is substantial and mitigating it requires as close to an absence of peanuts as possible
And peanuts are special in how easily they trigger severe reactions. Of all my son's allergies, peanuts are the one that scare us
I would hope the air is filtered before recirculating.
It's sort of is. But mostly they just mix it with a bit of outside air bumped up to pressure and release the difference, but it's not really filtered, except in the sense that over time it will be filtered because the contaminated air will eventually all leave.
I'm sure they have filters like cars have filters but they're not going to remove micro particles.
When did they remove HEPA filters from modern aircraft?
That seems extremely stupid when airplanes are already major disease vectors, especially after covid.
Most aircraft have HEPA filters. This was pretty regularly discussed during covid.
Aircraft ironically actually had cleaner air back when they allowed smoking, because they then actually did have to filter the air.
That just sounds like utter bullshit mate
I assume they filter it in some way, but okay.
Air in a pressurised plane isn't recirculated, it's replaced with new air from outside.
It is recirculated and fresh air is mixed with it.
Yeah I had that thought too but if this were the case, would you take a life threatening risk that no one else on the plane has peanuts? Wouldn't you drive instead? Or take a means of public transportation where they don't regularly sell your allergen?
That's not necessarily feasible. Maybe she has a schedule? Doesn't have a car? Doesn't have a license?
Also, some reactions are uncomfortable but not deadly. I have an anaphylactic allergy to tree nuts, as in, all true nuts (as peanuts are a legume, i'm fine with them). However, I've never had an anaphylactic reaction, though I was prescribed an EpiPen and told it could become worse with no warning. I get oral itchiness, stinging lips and mouth, heartburn, acid reflux, and diarrhea from actually eating nuts. I'm not sure what it is like for people who are sensitive to the airborne level. It might just resemb le environmental allergies like sneezing, red eyes and so forth. And if you do have to use an EpiPen, it's painful to inject and then you have to go to the hospital afterwards. Not certain death, again, but uncomfortable and inconvenient.
I imagine she navigated those things with great difficulty and made the best decisions she could. She, like any other person with a medical condition or disability, exists in a world that usually will be hostile to her survival. Yet she must still exist within it. Sometimes people have to do things like take flights and rarely can someone afford to take measures that would best protect them (like a private flight or something in this case). Sounds like she didn't want to announce her private medical information to everyone around her so she did what she could to keep safe, buy all the peanuts. Ideally she wouldn't have to, peanut allergies are pretty well known and if we cared about increasing access for people not having peanuts for sale on planes is a pretty simple step. Until then people will keep being put into scenarios like this then scrutinized for the choices they make.
I was watching a video of people who are "allergic" to electromagnetic waves. It's easy to forget empathy.
It's easy to laugh at them. But they are suffering from something rough.
If they're living their life and solving their own problems, god speed.
Allergy lady didn't go Karen. She bought all the nuts. Seems open and closed in my book. Yet people are mocking her for her disability? Okay.
She claims she offered to tell the people around her not to buy them but the airline refused. The airline says they had agreed to do that but she decided to buy them all anyway. So it wasn’t about giving up private medical information (which wouldn’t make much sense anyway since she announced it to the world through this article). There’s also the fact that you’re very rarely “forced” to fly anywhere, especially in Europe. I just checked Google Maps and a flight from London to Düsseldorf is a little over an hour. There are train options for about 5 and half hours. That’s obviously a pretty big difference, but definitely workable if the allergy is really that severe. There’s also the fact she could’ve called ahead of time and asked about options instead of trying to strongarm the flight attendants into doing what she wanted.
And yeah, it wouldn’t be that difficult to not sell peanuts but that’s not the only thing people are allergic too. Unless they were going to not sell any snacks and not allow any outside food, it’d be impossible to prevent all allergens. That’s one of those things that the only possible solution is the person with the disorder to do their best to mitigate exposure, which means making sacrifices like taken a few trains for 6 hours instead of a convenient flight. There’s lots of people that due to various restrictions can’t always take the most convenient option.
She did actually agree to have that information shared with the other passengers and then still bought all the peanuts. I'm not saying she's faking her allergy or something, I'm trying to wrap my head around her train of thought here. You can also take a car, a train, a bus, all means of transportation where the transport company doesn't sell you peanuts. Yeah it's less convenient but shit man, it won't kill you.
100% agree with this though
Sounds like she either didn't trust the solution and did what she could to make herself as safe as she could
I've known people with severe food allergies, so I empathize with the caution needed in their everyday lives, but I'm pretty sure this woman went overboard. Which is a bit odd, considering she was 27 years old, which makes me suspect she's dealt with this allergy for many years and should be used to having to deal with non-allergic people around her.
Take it easy, man. Clearly they're wrong, and I don't know better either, would you like to contribute something that'll inform us or just get mad on the internet?
I'll take Just Get Mad On the Internet for 200, Alex.
Yeah that sounds much easier
You don't know anything about this person your replying to. Stop with that attitude.
Ok Karen.
In the real world, where the rest of us live, if she's able to fly without any issues, she can handle people eating nuts around her.
If her allergy was severe enough that just breathing peanut particulates would trigger a reaction, she'd be suffering from an allergic reaction the entire time she was on a plane, every time she was on a plane.
This child overreacted like a typical Karen. And if she actually handled all the packages of nuts she bought, hate to break it to ya, but she would have had a reaction from the peanut oil that's inherently found on bags of, you know, peanuts.
You seem angry
There are a lot of tragic stories of people reacting to peanuts or other allergens and dying, in situations they thought were safe
Anaphylaxis hits hard and fast - even with an immediate response, it's often not enough to save the person afflicted
I routinely bring peanuts on flights. Not for this reason, just because I don't trust/rely on airlines to feed me.
Very cautiously.
I guess I sort of understand, this is an enclosed space with recycled AC, but it just seems unlikely that if it was this severe she'd take a life threatening risk like this. Right?