Based CA just following Europe on basic things
I have an 11 year old with celiac and relying on user report resources like “Find Me Gluten Free” means we essentially only eat at 3 places; I consider this akin to ADA requirements.
Unfortunately I wouldn’t trust a random place just because their menu says a particular item doesn’t have gluten.
If they don’t openly say that they cater to celiac, who knows if they use the same fryer for battered foods and fries, and the same grill for bread and meats
I used to work at a pizza place around the time that gluten free stuff was starting to get big. We added a gluten free pizza to our menu. The crusts came pre made, frozen, wrapped in plastic, with their own disposable aluminum tray.
However, we were a pizza place. The whole pizza station constantly has a light dusting of high-gluten flour on every surface, because that’s what happens when you’re tossing pizza dough around. We used the same cheese, sauce, and other toppings for them as the regular pizzas and I’m certain those had at least traces of that high gluten pizza flour in them because, again, flour was everywhere.
Honestly, no one with celiac or any other form of gluten sensitivity should probably ever step foot in a pizzeria, I’m sure the very air in that place probably had detectable levels of gluten.
If this turns out like the cancer warning regulations in CA. They will just mark everything in the kitchen as ‘contains peanuts’ and call it a day.
Unless this is just about menus listing ingredients, that will almost certainly happen. There are people allergic to all sorts of things. Nearly everything is allergen to someone.
Here in Europe there is a list of the 14 most common allergenes and they have to be listed on the menu. Yes, there are people with uncommon allergies, but the majority of people have one of the common ones and they can be on the menu.
Wait, what? What kind of clown country are you guys running over there?
They advertise medication on TV in the US
Sometimes i pirate a tv show that still have the commercials in. America can’t be a real place.
They advertise prescription medication on TV in the US.
Over the counter cold medicine, aspirin and the like is advertised in many countries on the TV.
Now in canada as well!!!
Gotta love taking all the shit ideas from down south by osmosis
Predatory financial “advice” and medical devices that sometimes work as intended too!
and nonstop gambling ads targeting young people!
We have a TV with antenna and holy shit, broadcast TV has become a caricature of itself. several-minutes-long commercials and a lot of them are just outright scams with what you mentioned as well as weird supplements hawked by has-been conservative pundits, and Christian content publishing services that use AI backgrounds.
Well how else are we supposed to find out that there exist diseases with names and cures?!?
Go to the doctor? Can’t afford that shit!
-the American horror story
Hopefully epi-pens
Unfortunately, paying for about a billion ad campaigns is the main reason (apart from pure profiteering of course) why epi-pens cost several times more in the US than anywhere else.
These laws are driven by lawyers. They can then file nuisance suits or class action suits on a regular basis. Businesses will pay just to avoid legal costs.
Isn’t it just a small number of billionaires in a trench coat at this point?
Wait is that why his hands are so small?
I know right? Listing that sort of thing is just basic not-being-a-dick territory.
I have no idea how they got so far from their bubble.
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We already do that in mine, and it’s not a requirement. Restaurants should be doing this. You should know your product, and you should warn people who may not know that the sesame seeds you have are processed along with peanuts. It’s just basic human decency.
You would be shocked how many restaurants don’t have a clue what is in their food.
Probably as you’d be shocked how many don’t actually prepare it on site. It comes in packs, frozen and is reheated for many places.
Sysco has ruined many restaurants.
I’ve got one better, ask your fish market where their food comes from.
the ocean, the sea, the river, the brook, the creek, or more specifically the water
“Well, a truck shows up on Tuesdays…”
Of course.
But maybe…
Wonder if they’d have to report it if it just happened to be in the same kitchen.
Its not already required!?
It’s not required in Sweden at least. But most menus will list ingredients or descriptions so you know what you’re ordering. I dunno, it’s never been a problem…
This sounds like California is just going to get a repeat of “prop 65”.
I can see how everything will have an asterisk that reads “may contain trace amounts of, bla, bla, bla, etc…”
It is an EU regulation since 2014 though, so it should be required in Sweden.
Between cancer warnings and allergen warnings every transaction in CA will require a 3 page disclaimer.
‘may cause cancer’ warning.
which had the opposite effect
I’m lactose intolerant to the point that a single sip of milk will wreck the rest of my day within 30 minutes of consumption, so if I ever eat out, I always ask if there’s dairy in EVERYTHING, even stuff you wouldn’t normally think has any dairy at all. Unless you prepare the food yourself, you just never know. My lactose intolerance isn’t life threatening, but I can’t imagine how difficult it is for people with allergies that can legit go into shock and die from them. Eating out must be a nightmare, or just something they’re forced to avoid totally.
I have the same level as lactose and also wheat intolerance. I load and carry loperamide every time I leave a safe “toilet haven”. Lactase/lactrase pills don’t suffice. I also have some inconvenient and inconsistent allergies. So I am always at maximum 30 minutes from my home or hotel. In almost all European countries I have been to however, restaurants tended to know their shit. Literally. (Save Serbia and Bulgaria, could you not at least learn from your neighbours?)
The amount of lactase needed is a function of how much lactose you consume. I don’t think I make any lactase at all and it’s not exactly possible to overdose on lactase so I down multiple 20,000 unit pills every time there could be lactose in something and that seems to work quite well. If I’m eating a dairy-based meal like pizza or something with a lot of cream then I take a few pills with every few bites.
Thank you for this tip. I didn’t think of it that way, I just kept going with the assumption that lactase pills just didn’t have any effect at all since I followed my doctor’s recommendations for specific amounts. I’ll try your tip (safely at home).
I feel your pain!
I had a manager once who was allergic to citrus. Like your allergy it was more “ruin her day” not “send her to the ER” but it was nearly impossible for her to avoid unless she made everything from scratch.
While avoiding food with lactose is a legit way to deal with it, if you’re not aware, I believe that there’s enzymes that you can take with the food to break it down, same way that you can take Beano to break down the sugars there to avoid flatulence after eating beans.
hits Wikipedia
Sounds like it. I’ve never used it, so I can’t personally endorse it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactase
Lactase (EC 3.2.1.108) is an enzyme produced by many organisms and is essential to the complete digestion of whole milk. It breaks down the sugar lactose into its component parts, galactose and glucose. Lactase is found in the brush border of the small intestine of humans and other mammals. People deficient in lactase or lacking functional lactase may experience the symptoms of lactose intolerance after consuming milk products.[1] Microbial β-galactosidase (often loosely referred to as lactase) can be purchased as a food supplement and is added to milk to produce “lactose-free” milk products.
Commercial lactase is used as a medication for lactose intolerance. Since it is an enzyme, its function can be inhibited by the acidity of the stomach. However, it is packaged in an acid-proof tablet, allowing the enzyme to pass through the stomach intact and remain in the small intestine. In the small intestine it can act on ingested lactose molecules, allowing the body to absorb the digested sugar which would otherwise cause cramping and diarrhea. Since the enzyme is not absorbed, it is excreted.
Lactaid sucks and it’s much easier to just avoid dairy. I’m vegan now but when I occasionally ate dairy I used lactaid and it was like “this turns a terrible situation into a moderately bad situation, that is still pretty awful and uncomfortable”
Yup, it sucks. You can’t trust it to work and you never know how much you need, or if it will work at all.
Oh yes, I’m well versed in lactase tablets. I always have these on hand, both Lactaid and Lactojoy (the hard stuff from Germany with 14,500 FCCs of lactase). The issue is that if you keep eating the food with lactose, you have to keep taking the lactase tablets, because you’re body doesn’t produce it (or very little) on its own.
I accidentally ate something with lactose (Chinese food, of all things) last month and had to take 8 Lactaid pills and 2 Lactojoys just to keep myself off the toilet for the rest of the day. There’s no way to tell how much lactose I consumed, how much lactase I need to counteract it, etc. It’s just not a game I’m willing to play, especially out in public. It’s like poisoning myself intentionally and then gambling with how much antidote to take before the pain sets in. Dairy just isn’t worth it.
I have a seafood sensitivity. One of my biggest pet peeves is that places never label when stuff has seafood. I’m always suuuper careful around Asian and Italian cuisine because of it, I’ve even found seafood in “vegetarian” plates before. It drives me nuts and sucks for everyone involved.
I wish people treated food restrictions more seriously
This is good news for vegans as well. I hope my state does this
There are literally people who are allergic to water. How common does an allergy need to be for it to be declared?
I haven’t looked at the law but I would assume its the same common allergens as are already required to be listed on ingredient lists.
Edit: indeed, it’s the 9 most common: milk, eggs, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, sesame and soybeans. It’s in the article.
Seems reasonable and not a huge burden. It’s not like restaurants don’t know what’s in their food. Right?
Restaurants often don’t know what’s in their food, largely because of cross contamination. Baked goods are a particularly dangerous area for those with food allergies, due to how carelessly ingredients like flour is processed.
In recent years, we’ve seen an uptick in brands use major allergens as cost-saving filler in their products. Those are intentional contamination. The incidents of accidental contamination are much higher, as much equipment is shared in the processing and packaging if various products, equipment which is exposed to major allergens.
Society needs to start taking this seriously and place rigorous controls on how food containing major allergens is processed and handled. Products and ingredients that contain major allergens should be carefully regulated and inspected, and should not be reused for products that do not contain those allergens in their recipes. We also need to be more stringent about preventing companies from using allergens as fillers. The carelessness with which our food is handled is shocking.
Wild stuff. Is this consistent world wide? Do any countries set good examples?
How can someone be allergic to the main component of their bodies?
WHO, among others, have guidelines for this.
https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/B09009
For comparison, here is Canada’s list of recognized “priority food allergens.”
By itself, this is not helpful. What happens is that restaurants will claim that everything contains allergens, or even add allergens to things so that they can confidently say whether it does contain any. Instead, we also need to tighten food safety standards so that there is dramatically reduced risk of cross-contamination. Supply chains are a major problem for people with allergies, because there are so many points where accidental contamination can happen that those at the end of the chain - like restaurants - are terrified of making assumptions.
This is very helpful. I have two major common food allergies and we have such a law in the EU. Yes, some restaurants just write every allergene on every item and call it a day, but those are usually not the good ones. A lot of good restaurants just write tge actually allergenes and “may contain traces of” on the menu and usually the staff is also informed and trained to answer questions regarding allergies.
Yep, that is exactly what happened with the CA cancer warnings. Got cancer warnings on basically everything now because it’s easier to just mark it than attempt to do anything else.
Exactly. I am strongly in favor of more stringent food handling and labelling guidelines, but labelling alone leads to abuse, misuse, and dilution. We need some concrete food safety regulations that take into account the entire supply line, preventing both accidental and deliberate contamination with major allergens.
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I am curious at how you managed to arrive at the polar opposite of the point I was making.
What part of his comment made you think he’s a shill for big business and pushing for deregulation?
