Food Allergies: Read the Label
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About a month ago I was at work and a guy ran past me and into the bathroom. Always ready to do the bouncer thing, I was going to put him out. He stayed in the restroom for a long time - a really long time, so I grabbed his buddies, who decided to call an ambulance. It turned out that the guy wasn’t drunk at all - he ordered something off of the menu and didn’t read the ingredients. The dish contained shrimp, which he was allergic to.
If you have allergies to certain foods, you MUST read labels; it can literally mean life or death. You have to be label savvy though - some foods and substances have several different names, so you have to know what to look for when you read labels. For example, on labels containing egg products, you may see any of the following: eggs, egg substitutes, lecithin, globulin, livetin, albumin, conalbumin. ovalbumin, ovomucin, ovomucoid, ovotransferrin, ovovitellin, meringue, lysozyme vitellin, Simplesse or silico-albuminate!!
If you have never heard of some of these, then chances are you have consumed egg products and not known it. That could be lethal if you are allergic to them. Yahoo! health posted an article which contains a list of common ingredients and several of their aliases. Eat. Drink. Better recently posted an article focusing on corn and its many aliases. When it comes to labels and hidden ingredients, be well informed.
Written by: Donnell Peavy
It is true one should know exactly what is in our food, especially if allergic or sensitive to certain ingredients. If LYSOZYME is a listed ingredient, the diligent shopper should be aware of all the facts, because if they were, they would prefer to buy such foods that chose to fortify or preserve naturally. The truth is that of all the egg-white proteins, Lysozyme has the least statistical allergenic incidence. Even though less than 0,3% of the population have allergies to proteins of animal origin, such as milk, egg and cod, 35% of those have shown to have anti-Lysozyme IgE, which represents a mere 0,0084% of the world population.