Talking Allergies

Finally, Health Canada is releasing it's findings from the 2009-2010 public consultation about precautionary labeling of allergens!

Check it out here: http://allergicliving.com/index.php/201 ... n-its-way/

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy and green beans) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: Oral Allergy Syndrome, Allergic to Birch trees

That would be excellent if there was consistency in the May Contain labelling.

It really makes it easier when a product is clearly labelled. And those are the products that we support! As said in another thread somewhere, we don't buy (unless we have no alternative) products with poor labelling - especially the light yellow on clear plastic...

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me: allergic to crustaceans plus environmental
teenager: allergic to hazelnuts, some other foods and environmental

Susan, do you know of any updates to the May Contain labels? Implementation or guidelines?

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me: allergic to crustaceans plus environmental
teenager: allergic to hazelnuts, some other foods and environmental

Well, they have organized all of the information gathered and are reviewing this...
No idea how long this will take...but the summary was posted October 14TH 2011...

http://hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/consult/_aller ... ge-eng.php

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy and green beans) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: Oral Allergy Syndrome, Allergic to Birch trees

from a link at that site I could only see that: Canada's new food allergen labelling regulations will come into force on August 4, 2012 but that appears to be about components of ingredients (e.g., seasoning). With a quick read I could not see anything about May Contains.

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me: allergic to crustaceans plus environmental
teenager: allergic to hazelnuts, some other foods and environmental

Consultation on Health Canada's Food Allergen Precautionary Labelling Policy Renewal - Summary of Comments from the Online and Face-to-Face Consultation Sessions
http://tinyurl.com/83sv228

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy and green beans) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: Oral Allergy Syndrome, Allergic to Birch trees

I feel like it's still lots of working about reviewing but like Walooet...it seems like they are still skirting the issue of may contains which was a HUGE part of this entire thing.

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DD 12 yrs -no allergies
4 yr old DS - asthma/eczema Anaphylactic to Peanuts, all tree nuts, sesame , all pea/lentil legumes, gelatin.
Allergic to trees, grass,ragweed, feathers, dander, mold and dust.
Outgrew eggs, fish, shellfish

I caught part of a discussion on the radio about cuts to the CFIA relating to food labeling in the new federal budget this week. Does anyone else know anything about this? It sounded like the cuts would leave industry policing itself in terms of some labeling issues. I didn't hear if it related to allergens or to claims like low sodium etc.

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13 year old daughter -- lives with life-threatening allergies to milk, tree nuts and peanuts; seasonal allergies (birch, maple, ragweed); pet allergies; asthma; and eczema
10 year old son - no allergies

Today I spoke with a retailer of a small specialty grocery store where they repackage and label products. We talked about CFIA and the labelling. His understanding was that the labels were just going to be Contains and that there wasn't even going to be any May Contains anymore. I could not get that from anything I read at CFIA although I confess that it makes me drowsy to read it...

Would really appreciate anyone that has read it to post if they know about that.

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me: allergic to crustaceans plus environmental
teenager: allergic to hazelnuts, some other foods and environmental

I think they do that on purpose...glad I'm not the only one!

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy and green beans) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: Oral Allergy Syndrome, Allergic to Birch trees

Just hashed through the documents, and am also drowsy confused. Seems that may contains are only for ingredients that may or may not be present, not related to allergens on shared equipment??

I also wish that there was a CONTAINS statement before the MAY CONTAINS. In order to really highlight the allergen that is known to be present, rather than having it solely in the ingredient list.

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DSs 12, 12, 14 all PA

I find in the US, there are frequently 'CONTAINS' statements at the bottom, but no 'MAY CONTAINS' on the same product. I find this totally not useful in a new city when on vacation. I can re-read the ingredients list 3 times and make triple sure our allergens are not on the list, but what I can't do, is find out the 'may contains' quickly enough to know whether I can buy it or not. Because of this experience, we generally bring bread, crackers, cookies etc with us on trips to the US.

It would be great to have both types of statements on every product! We can only wish. . .

I have also seen labels that say 'We use good manufacturing practices to segregate allergenic ingredients, including tree nuts and eggs, in our facility'. I will take a chance on these as long as they eat the product at home with me there.

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DD 2004 Allergy to peanuts, egg, sesame, and new: lentils and chick peas
DS 2006 Allergy to peanuts, tree nuts, milk, egg, kiwi fruit, eczema