{"id":171660,"date":"2018-07-17T23:45:49","date_gmt":"2018-07-18T03:45:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=171660"},"modified":"2018-07-17T23:45:49","modified_gmt":"2018-07-18T03:45:49","slug":"mom-blames-teens-death-on-packaging-for-peanut-cookies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/07\/17\/mom-blames-teens-death-on-packaging-for-peanut-cookies\/","title":{"rendered":"Mom blames teen’s death on packaging for peanut cookies"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\u201cWe<\/a>
\u201cWe take allergens very seriously,\u201d the company said in a statement, adding that the packaging for chewy cookies made with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups \u201cclearly shows that it contains peanuts through words and visuals.\u201d (Photo<\/a> by Mike Mozart\/Flickr<\/a>, CC BY 2.0<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WESTON, Fla. \u2014 A Florida mother blames the death of her 15-year-old daughter on what she calls confusing packaging for Reese’s Chips Ahoy cookies.<\/p>\n

In a July 12 Facebook post, Kelli Travers-Stafford wrote that her daughter Alexi mistakenly ate one of the cookies at a friend’s house despite her peanut allergy, because the top of the familiar red packaging was peeled back, hiding the Reese’s label.<\/p>\n

She says Alexi felt tingling in her mouth on June 25 and they administered two Epipens but Alexi quickly went into anaphylactic shock, stopped breathing and died within an hour and a half of eating the cookie.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a mother who diligently taught her the ropes of what was okay to ingest and what was not, I feel lost and angry because she knew her limits and was aware of familiar packaging, she knew what \u201csafe\u201d was,\u201d Travers-Stafford said in the post. \u201cA small added indication on the pulled back flap on a familiar red package wasn’t enough to call out to her that there was \u201cpeanut product\u201d in the cookies before it was too late.\u201d<\/p>\n

Travers-Stafford, who lives in Weston, which is near Fort Lauderdale, said she is sharing Alexi’s story to \u201cspread awareness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since her Facebook post, other parents are calling on Chips Ahoy’s parent company, Mondelez, to sell foods with allergens in different-colored packages.<\/p>\n

The company says it uses colours to distinguish chewy from chunky, and describes ingredients in prominent labels.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take allergens very seriously,\u201d the company said in a statement, adding that the packaging for chewy cookies made with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups \u201cclearly shows that it contains peanuts through words and visuals.\u201d<\/p>\n

The girl’s death \u201ctragically\u201d illustrates the fact that teens and young adults are at the greatest risk for severe allergic reactions, said Lisa Gable, CEO of Food Allergy Research & Education, a national advocacy non-profit organization.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis tragedy reinforces how important it is for people to not just be aware, but to truly understand that food allergies are potentially fatal,\u201d Gable said in a statement.<\/p>\n

She added that 1 in 13 children in the United States have at least one food allergy, and 40 per cent of those children have experienced a serious reaction.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery three minutes, someone in the U.S. goes to the emergency room for an allergic reaction, and every six minutes, someone goes to the ER for an anaphylactic reaction,\u201d Gable said. \u201cThat’s how serious this epidemic is.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WESTON, Fla. \u2014 A Florida mother blames the death of her 15-year-old daughter on what she calls confusing packaging for …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":171666,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[53547,53548,53545,53546,53549],"class_list":["post-171660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lifestyle","tag-alexi","tag-chips-ahoy","tag-florida-mother","tag-kelli-travers-stafford","tag-mondelez","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}