People Petition Against Tesco for ‘Overusing’ Peanut Warning

After noticing that Tesco supermarket chain had marked too many food products about the presence of peanuts in them, people have petitioned against Tesco. Over 12,500 people have signed a petition, asking the supermarket giant to stop the excessive use of warning ‘may contain nuts' on food items.

The act of signing petitions was launched by Claire Hussein from Portsmouth after she said that Tesco 'dramatically changed its labelling policy'. She said, “Suddenly, many previously safe foods are now apparently unsafe as they have ‘may contain nuts’ on them.”

The supermarket has put the warning stickers to a range of goods, including: potatoes, tonic water, and fruit juice. According to mothers of children with nut allergies, it is impossible to get anything for their offspring.

Tesco said that the warning about nuts was present on food items even before, though earlier it just said goods have been made in factories where nuts were used. But as per new rules, the font used for the warning was bigger than before.

Once the EU rules come into effect in December, labelling of possible food allergens will be compulsory.

Tesco said, “Our first priority is always the safety of our customers and we take great care to label our products with allergy advice where necessary. We only display these warnings on products when then there is a risk of cross-contamination”.

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Peanut allergy kills up to 10 people annually. People die from reactions caused by coming into contact with even minute quantities of peanuts.

At least one in 50 children is said to be allergic to peanuts which causes serious breathing problems. Those who are severely affected could die when exposed to even a trace of the nuts in their food.

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Source-Medindia