Tragedy that could make us all safer
IT TOOK the tragic death of a beautiful young teenager to prompt the wake-up call we all needed about the dangers of “mystery food”. A nutritionist friend of mine has often warned about what he calls “mystery food”. That’s snacks and fast food you buy over the counter, or from a street vendor, without really knowing what’s in it. It’s quite astonishing what we eat on the assumption it’s good stuff, and safe for us. He always warned about it because of the dodgy nutritional values, and unseen calories. But if you have a food allergy, you could also be taking a huge risk.
I don’t suppose any of us can really imagine a worse panic to be in than watching your own child collapse in anaphylactic shock and suffer a cardiac arrest on a plane, and be unable to do anything that could meaningfully help. But that’s what happened last year after young Natasha Ednan-Laperouse ate a baguette as she boarded a holiday flight to France.
Natasha was in Stansted Airport when she ate the roll from Pret A Manger. Knowing she had a serious food allergy, she had checked the label. It said nothing about containing sesame seeds, which ultimately proved fatal.
In front of her friend, her father, and horrified British Airways staff and passengers, Natasha went into shock, and there was nothing anyone could do about it. Her father, Nadim, said her symptoms came on “like an explosion”. Two EpiPens had no effect.
She was rushed to hospital in Nice, but died. Her mother spoke to her by phone, but all she could do was tell her unresponsive daughter how much she was loved. “I said, ‘Tashi, I love you so much, darling. I’ll be with you soon. I’ll be with you.’
“Because, when you’ve got children, you don’t want them to be without you, do you? They still need you. I fell to the ground. I couldn’t talk, I was engulfed with grief. I knew then she was gone – she was dead.”
She added that she spent many of the following months on the sofa, unable to function normally.
Natasha’s father said: “I really love my daughter, in a way that’s like one flesh. As a parent I’d die a thousand times, crucified, for her to live.” You heard the raw heartbreak in their every word.
Yet these grieving parents have done a remarkable thing. They have galvanised action, campaigned long and hard, and achieved a real change that will make an enormous difference to the way we buy our food.
They have used their grief, and Natasha’s story, to force government and the food industry to take more responsibility. Heck, they have even pulled off something truly miraculous – making Michael Gove look positively heroic. As Environment Secretary, he has taken up this cause, and run with it. And last week a range of proposals for tough new labelling laws was announced, dubbed Natasha’s Law. About time.
Frankly, this was a tragedy that we sleep-walked into. We all want our food fast, easily available. Who makes their own sandwiches any more? We expect to be able to buy snacks, soups and salads anywhere, easily. Our demand for instant food gratification has made us complacent. We took it on (sometimes) misguided trust. We should have seen it coming. There have, of course, been other tragedies involving serious allergies. There’s a reason they no longer serve peanuts on most planes, after several incidents, one where a young girl went into anaphylactic shock because a nearby passenger opened a bag of peanuts, another where a youngster had a bad reaction from eating one cashew nut, and they had to make an emergency landing.
Airlines have learned a lesson that we should have taken seriously much sooner. Our labelling laws are complicated, with stuff about where food is prepared, in-house or off-premises. Natasha’s parents have accused our laziness of having played Russian roulette with lives.
And you can understand their anger. To be fair, many food outlets take immense care. Pret A Manger acknowledges it let Natasha down and wants to see change come from this tragedy. So yes, it has taken the horror of one girl’s death to highlight the need for greater food responsibility, and an end to “mystery food”. And it took the immense courage of one bereaved family to edge it towards being brought into law – hopefully very soon. Natasha’s Law is a fitting way to pay tribute to a life horrifically cut short by a few sesame seeds. It’s reckoned two million of us in the UK, have serious food allergies. We all deserve better.