It’s one little section in a great big ballpark so that my little boy can see a ballgame just like every other kid and feel normal for a couple of hours. Just a couple of hours. He’s a LITTLE BOY. He loves baseball. For goodness sake, it’s not even a weekend game we’re asking for…these are Monday and Wednesday games. This isn’t about human rights or banning things people can’t live without. It’s about some little kids getting to sit in the stands in St. Louis, this great baseball town, and take in the atmosphere, participate in the roar of the crowd, maybe get Fredbird’s beak on their little heads. One little section in a great big ballpark. Everyday our lives are about protecting my son’s life - HIS LIFE! HE COULD DIE FROM THIS. From a stinking little peanut! We live this everyday. Just a couple of hours of normalcy for these little kids…and all of this cruelty posted on a public forum by so-called ADULTS. It makes me sad.

I have more life-threatening allergies than anyone else I know (socially), and stuff like this irks me.

Okay, if it stays like this, one or two sections, a few times per year, as a way of attracting a specific group, that’s fine, commendable and good business. But if it becomes a matter of ACCOMMODATING these freaks (oh yes, I said it) by forcing others to accept restrictions, well, NO WAY. It’s ludicrous. Should we have entire legume/banana/egg/poultry/raw vegetable/random grains-free sections of every grocery store, and a ban on certain types of trees in every neighborhood so that Kev can pretend to be just like everyone else? Yeah. Great. Oh, and no-thank-you.

Life is hard. Life is patently unfair. Deal with it; don’t impose your personal problem on other people any more than is necessary.

There are lots of things I can’t do due to my own freakish issues. It’s just the way it is. I gave up being a fighter pilot, astronaught, professional baseball player, etc. If it means not going to the ballpark without wearing special clothing and attention to weather conditions, those to whom it matters are perfectly capable of dealing with it.

But, rant aside….this is still pretty cool program, as it is.

This is a good idea and I’ve got the ER bills to prove it.
The real problems are restaurants that use spoons and knives on nut-bearing foods and then contaminate other foods with them.
Anyone that has had to stab themselves with a 3 inch needle in an Epi-pen will agree with me.

Baseball, as necessary as it is for the life of red-blooded patriotic Americans, is still found on TV.

This is for Teresa.

Your lack of compassion on this issue is only superseded by the depth of your inadequate information. Your allergies, while they may bother your or even make you sick, will not kill you within 4 minutes or put you in the ICU for the tiniest exposure. Same could be said for your other examples. People with eyeglasses? Are you actually serious with that comparison? Your other examples are equally ridiculous. Children with severe peanut allergies live a life of doing without so many things. Any effort by the public or a ball park to make special accommodations so that these kids can enjoy something others take for granted, is welcomed and demonstrates the best in humanity. Your stance, demonstrates intolerance, ignorance and lack of compassion.

I think this is great. And it’s vastly different from a smoking section on several counts, not the least of which is the fact that a peanut-free zone does no harm to others. I, for one, am tired of being near a smoking section and being subjected to second-hand smoke, which is detrimental to my health. (Frankly, I was recently at a Cards game and disgusted by the cloud of smoke I had to endure leaving the stadium. I would love to see the Cardinals ban smoking anywhere on their property.) Further, children with these allergies did nothing to bring them on. It isn’t a planned behavior. This is no different than parking spots for the disabled. Kudos to the Rascals and the Cardinals!

Just did a little quick research on peanut allergies. Researchers have seen a definite genetic connection in that food allergies seem to run in families. Maybe mom’s allergic to eggs, but for some reason the kid’s body decides that peanuts are evil incarnate instead. One article gave some more potential “whys.” One was what I mentioned about kids being overprotected from the environment, one suggested that peanut processing may be to blame rather than the peanuts themselves, and yet another pointed the blame to what mom may or may not have eaten in her pregnancy. One theory suggested that the inital allergen trigger might be soy products–God knows they’re everywhere–which then transfers over to peanuts. Cases of peanut allergy have doubled in the past ten years but that may be due to increased recognition of the allergy. Incidentally, the peanut allergy can run anywhere from a rash to digestive upset to respiratory issues. Severe respiratory shock is rare, but there is some evidence that it can occur with repeated exposure to peanuts. On the other hand some kids outgrow it completely. So maybe parents of kids with minor reactions have been told horror stories and don’t want to risk Johnny’s rash and sneezing turning into something much worse. Still, there has to be something they can do with these kids to enable them to lead relatively normal lives and make this a non-issue for society at large.

As a parent of a child who has gone into anaphylactic shock from ingesting a peanut product I applaud both teams for taking this initiative. Sure, it’s going to tremendously inconvenience an untold number of patrons who desperately wanted to sit in the one section set aside by each team for a handful of games. But like we have to deal with our child’s situation, I’m sure they will be able to deal with it also.

My son was not raised in a bubble, he has not been overly protected or coddled or been followed around with hand sanitizer and Lysol. No, he just has a peanut allergy. Fortunately it’s not as severe as some, but if he ingests something with peanuts there will be a problem. This is why the epi pen is always at hand.

We don’t go out of our way to ask for special treatment, we understand that most don’t know his situation (or, in some cases, just don’t care), and we deal with it.

Someone posing as a doctor should not make a general statement like “if they don’t eat the peanuts or anything that is cooked in peanut oil, they’re not affected”. A doctor would know that refined peanut oil will not cause allergic reactions in the vast majority of individuals, however crude peanut oil is more likely to do so. Nice try, “Fritz”.

Lastly, to Jeff, it sounds like you handled your situation at the game with much more composure than I would have. It doesn’t matter if a person is eating peanuts, popcorn, cotton candy or whatever… if he was that big of a jack*** and continued to get it on my child, there would have been a severe reaction, and not of the allergy kind.

What percent of the population suffers from peanut allergies, and what percent of those who do suffer severe or life-threatening reactions?

If sports teams want to set aside a portion of seats in their facilities to accomodate fans with special needs, they can knock themselves out. Doesn’t bother me in the slightest. It would be Draconian to not allow any fan to have peanuts just to appease one or two. This has already happened in schools and some airlines.

Who are the “River City Rascals?” Until I can’t have a box of Cracker Jacks @ Busch, I couldn’t care less. Peanuts are great for you, and they’re an American tradition at sporting events. If you took the allergies of the whole American population and banned every possible one, there’d be no food to eat. Why don’t they just ban fish @ restaurants, chocolate from desserts, etc.? Gimme a break people!