For that very reason I've been withholding any judgment on this one. I don't trust the accuracy of what is initially reported anyhow, but I'm in baseball country there's always a ton of food there--I can't even bring my kids who are not playing to the area that the games are played. The reaction, meh, could have been the first time he was this sensitive, the first big reaction, I don't know but if it is true that his known threshold was this low and his known history includes reactions that severe you lose the credibility that you had no idea he'd need epinephrine, or that you don't have to read labels or that you can ingest the unknown. Like in many cases where monetary awards are made towards injuries there are mediating factors that include personal responsibility.

But who knows about this or what happened on the United flight that was diverted. Sometimes it's so inaccurate urban legend becomes reality in the public's eye like the Mcdonald's hot coffee injury, which was much more than simple consumer error. I have no idea why this made it into the news.

I'm so lucky that I'm a chemist.  Zero isn't "zero."  Ever.

I'm further fortunate in my spouse, also a chemist who understands this point and did WAY before food allergies entered our lives in a big way with DD.

It's all about partitioning during extraction-- and that is ALWAYS fractional.  <sigh>


Just the same, this particular incident I have to wonder if there wasn't some other source of contamination at work here-- because people who react to levels this low on a regular basis very definitely do NOT live normally, and they also don't tend to try new things when out and about like this.  I wonder if this youngster washed his hands VERY thoroughly-- and washed down the bottle prior to consumption.  Our experience (having a DD with this kind of threshold) is that both of those things are far more frequently factors in major reactions than ultratrace contamination (which is what this would have been).

Ditto. 

Ad what drives me even crazier is that DS has read those statements as well and tried to argue with me that we should eat @ a local Burger joint that opened even though they cook with peanut oil, because after all, it is highly refined. 

As then he tries to explain the differences between cold pressed and refined oils to me, as if I had never heard this shocking news. 

It drives me crazy that refined oils are exempt because "most" people don't react to them. Some do, clearly, so don't these people matter? Nothing should be exempt when it comes to a life threatening food allergy.

http://www.loudountimes.com/news/article/after_sons_allergic_reaction_ashburn_mom_looks_for_answers123

From the article, it doesn't sound as if the family had an EpiPen with them. I'm glad everything worked out OK.