Health Officials Debate Standards for Food Allergy Warnings

(CBC News – The Canadian Press/AP)

Health officials in the U.S. and Canada are debating setting standards for food allergy warnings, amid increasing concern that consumers are so confused they’re starting to ignore the warnings.

It’s one of the biggest frustrations of life with food allergies: That hodgepodge of warnings that a food might accidentally contain the wrong ingredient.

The warnings are voluntary – meaning there’s no way to know if foods that don’t bear them really should. And they’re vague: Is “may contain traces of peanuts” more reliable than “made in the same factory as peanuts?”

“Really, the safest thing you can do is make all your food at home from scratch, period,” says Margaret Sova McCabe of Sanbornton, N.H., whose son Tommie, almost eight years old, is allergic to peanuts, dairy, wheat and five other ingredients.

But she doesn’t find that practical – and repeatedly has spotted longtime favourite “safe” foods suddenly bearing new warnings that accidental contamination is possible after all.

“Sometimes we buy the product anyway, and sometimes we don’t,” says McCabe, who is a law professor and questions how often the warnings signal liability protection rather than true risk. “What does this really mean? Can I count on it, as a consumer, to really have any meaning?” she asks.

The Food and Drug Administration will ask those same questions at a public hearing on September 16, a first step toward developing what it calls “a long-term strategy” to clear the confusion. Read more.