$600 EpiPens, My Daughter, and My Problem With Big Pharma
I first wrote this article about a month and a half ago, so when I saw the stories coming out about the exorbitant cost of EpiPens in the news, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the makers of them got called out.
Almost exactly one year ago (in July 2015), my daughter had a severe allergic reaction to cashews that were in a bar that my wife gave to her. It was one of the scariest days of our lives. Thanks to God, my wife’s quick actions, and the skill of several great medical professionals, my daughter came out of that scary situation okay.
The medical professionals who witnessed my daughter’s allergic reaction said that it was one of the worst they’d ever seen.
That unforgettable day in July was the day that we found out that my daughter was very allergic to tree nuts (cashews, pecans, walnuts, almonds, etc.). Discovering that she had an allergy was as shocking as the anaphylactic event itself.
Allergy? Huh?! I’ve barely even known anyone in my entire life who had an allergy, and neither me nor my wife have anybody in our family with life threatening food allergies! On top of all this, we try to eat healthy for the most part, and we especially tried to do so when we were pregnant with our daughter. What’s up?!
Finding Out How To Live After Discovering a Food Allergy with Your Kid
When you find out that you or someone close to you has a food allergy, you find out how many things out there in our ultra-processed food world you have to avoid. And you would be surprised of how many things out there not only have nuts, but were made around nuts and could contain dust that could be life threatening.
Like, how do you function?
Thankfully, I’ve found that functioning right now isn’t much of a problem. The main thing you have to do is make a habit of cooking stuff yourself and avoiding processed foods, which we try to do anyway. But I still can’t just rest with the fact that my daughter deals with a food allergy that could threaten her life.
Doesn’t this just happen to those “other” people?
Yes, this is how I felt. I know somebody out there knows what I’m talking about. You feel like only those other people are the ones who get allergies…who gain too much weight…who develop a bad disease…who (fill in the blank). I can tell you from personal experience that it’s a trip when you become one of “those” people.
As my wife and I began to learn more about food allergies like my daughter’s, one of the things that became more apparent and disturbing to me was the increasing prevalence of these kinds of food allergies. Almost unheard of during my parents’ time, severe food allergies affect 7-8% of kids in the United States, and that number is growing. As a matter of fact, the prevalence of food allergies among American kids increased about 50% between 1997 and 2011. That’s insane. And to think now that my child is among the statistic.
Surely There Is a Reason for These Allergies, Don’t You Think?
But why, though? Why is this happening? Surely, there is a reason!
I don’t know about you, but I am a firm believer in the idea that there is a reason for everything. Nothing just happens. For example, we become obese when we either eat too much food, or when we eat the wrong kinds of food. We develop Type 2 Diabetes when we carry too much weight, and when we consistently consume too much sugar. We develop High Blood Pressure when we miss sleep, pack on the pounds, consume too much sodium, sit around instead of exercising, and live generally stressful lives. Every effect has some sort of cause. So how about the causes of food allergies?
I’ll continue on to some of what I’ve discovered as far as possible causes are concerned in Part 2 of this post. I’ll also talk about my personal experience with the absolute ridiculousness of EpiPen costs. I hope you stay tuned.
Do you know someone with food allergies? How have food allergies affected you? Talk to me below.
