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"While we found that one in 10 adults have food allergy, nearly twice as many adults think that they are allergic to foods, while their symptoms may suggest food intolerance or other food related conditions," says lead author Ruchi Gupta, MD, MPH, from Lurie Children's, who also is a Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. "It is important to see a physician for appropriate testing and diagnosis before completely eliminating foods from the diet. If food allergy is confirmed, understanding the management is also critical, including recognizing symptoms of anaphylaxis and how and when to use epinephrine."
[...] "We were surprised to find that adult-onset food allergies were so common," says Dr. Gupta. "More research is needed to understand why this is occurring and how we might prevent it."
The study data indicate that the most prevalent food allergens among U.S. adults are shellfish (affecting 7.2 million adults), milk (4.7 million), peanut (4.5 million), tree nut (3 million), fin fish (2.2 million), egg (2 million), wheat (2 million), soy (1.5 million), and sesame (.5 million).
(Score: 5, Insightful) by mhajicek on Sunday January 06 2019, @06:59AM (5 children)
Don't care if it's officially an allergy or what, it's the fact that I get sick if I eat it that matters.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 5, Informative) by bradley13 on Sunday January 06 2019, @08:25AM (4 children)
That's fine, that's called a "food sensitivity" or a "food intolerance" - but it's something completely different from an allergy. Food sensitivity can have you sitting on the toilet for a day after eating something. A food allergy can be life threatening.
Practically speaking, a food sensitivity means "don't order that off the menu". A food allergy means that the kitchen has to practice clean-room techniques, to completely separate your food from any trace of contamination. This may not seem like a difference to you, the customer, but it is a huge difference to the people serving you.
Just as an example: I know a guy fairly well, who is head-chef in a restaurant. In his (as in many) restaurants, practically everything has butter in it, or is cooked in butter. Butter is everywhere in the kitchen. A guy comes in, warns the waiter that he has a serious dairy allergy. Clean room time: for this guys order, every single items has to be specially prepped in single portions, using olive oil or other substitutes, using freshly washed pots and pans and utensils. A huge effort, massively disruptive, and...at the end of the meal, the guy orders a cheese platter for dessert. The chef had to be talked out of "visiting" the customer personally...
Because there are so many nitwits with fake allergies, it's easy for the restaurant to brush them off - right up until a real allergy lands someone in the hospital.
Sorry, this is one of my pet peeves, because I've seen it too many times...
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 06 2019, @08:43AM
Visiting my ass. He would simply have the cheese platter "specially seasoned."
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 06 2019, @10:35AM
That wouldn't work for me, my personal kryptonite is egg..microscopic traces make me ill (hello toilet my old friend, it's days on you that I'll now spend...with apologies to Simon&Garfunkel) larger quantities then it's anaphylaxis.
This crap hit me in my mid-teens, one day I could eat eggs...the next, it was hospital time after eating a bit of a boiled one...and here we are, 40 years of preparing my own food later..
I do not eat out, as I cant risk it, and I do not regard it as either reasonable or fair to expect any public eatery to minimise the chances of cross-contamination by implementing the near clinical separation of pots, pans and utensils I have at home for my use alone, and also to have a separate cleaning regime for them as well (I learned *that* lesson the hard way early on)
I'm not alone, all the people I know with serious food allergies are quite paranoid about their food and tend not to eat anything prepared by anyone but themselves/SOs.
If I was a restaurateur, I'd display a very prominent notice detailing all the ingredients used in the kitchens both the entrance and on the menu, if someone with an allergy or intolerance to any of them still insists on ordering then I'd hit them with a liability waiver (lawyer drafted and approved) to be signed and witnessed before proceeding.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 06 2019, @01:08PM (1 child)
Seriously? The "average" restaurant couldn't possibly clean room their kitchen at a moment's notice. Some may find it impossible to do on a week's notice, given that they probably lack the training. I think that for something like that, you need to have prior knowledge of the restaurant, or call ahead to make arrangements.
I mean, really seriously - if my life DEPENDS ON never passing a single drop of butter (or similar substance) between my lips, damn if I'm going to walk in off the street, and just casually mention to a wait staff that I'm allergic to dairy, or nuts, or fish, or rape seed oil, or peanust (which are not technically nuts after all), or whatever.
As for your friend visiting the allergy guy who orders a cheese platter - I'm right with him. If I'm standing in the way of him reaching for the chef's knife, I'll pick it up and hand it to him. I'm helpful, like that. ;^)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 07 2019, @12:34AM
If I'm standing in the way of him reaching for the chef's knife, I'll pick it up and hand it to him. I'm helpful, like that. ;^)
Uh oh, don't let that crazy girl, what's her name?, haiku susuki? Don't let her see this post! Actually do tell her about it. Her reaction will be priceless!