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The following transcripts are reproduced courtesy of The Sunday Program (http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/)

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May 1st 2005 - When food can be fatal
May 15th 2005 - When food can be fatal: part two
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"When food can be fatal"
Transcript (01/05/2005)

HELEN DALLEY: It's a parent's nightmare. Your 7-year-old is at school camp in a remote part of Sydney's outskirts — fun and games supposed to be the order of the day. But something goes horribly wrong. One minute your child is happy, healthy. The next minute, quite literally, he is at death's door, fighting desperately for his life.

SOPHIA NEOU: One day they rang me, the teacher, cry and said, "He's turning blue and he's stopped breathing." I nearly died. I was nearly die, too. I don't know what to do.

PARAMEDIC: He developed shortness of breath. He got very anxious and agitated and then his airways started to swell around his lips, his throat and then his blood pressure dropped and that's when he passed out.

HELEN DALLEY: Running dangerously low on resuscitation drugs for young William, the ambulance paramedics can no longer cope on their own and a medical emergency team from CareFlight is called in.

DR SHANE TREVITHICK, CAREFLIGHT: He was critically ill when we arrived. He was deep purple in colour because he didn't have enough oxygen in his blood. He was only barely conscious. He started vomiting, which threatened to fill his airway with vomit. He was desperately ill. His heart had slowed down to 40 beats a minute, which is critically low in a small child. Normally we expect it to be 150 beats a minute in a sick child but he was 30 seconds from an unrecoverable cardiac and respiratory arrest — 30 seconds from death.

HELEN DALLEY: William has mild asthma throughout the day, already weakening his immune system, but the medical team recognises that the severity and speed of this life-threatening assault on his airways is not because of his asthma but, rather, is the result of something seemingly benign — dinner.

DR SHANE TREVITHICK: Around dinner time, somehow, despite the best efforts of everyone looking after him, he'd been exposed to something he was allergic to. And it was immediately obvious when we looked at him that an anaphylaxis had taken place. His airway was swollen, his lips and tongue were swollen and he had a lot of difficulty breathing and, together with the collapse, it was quite clear that he had an anaphylaxis, and your chance of dying from anaphylaxis increases if you have asthma.

HELEN DALLEY: William's rapid decline is nothing short of terrifying.

DR SHANE TREVITHICK: In his case, it happened over about 10 minutes. From exposure to collapse, it can be as little as 5-10 minutes.

HELEN DALLEY: Frighteningly, the drama happening to little William is occurring in many families right across Australia. Allergies to food, particularly peanuts, tree nuts, eggs, milk, seafood, can be so strong, they cause an anaphylactic reaction — a reaction so severe in some children, it shocks any parent who witnesses it.

SHANE TOWNSEND: Anaphylaxis is probably one of the scariest things you'll want to witness. They swell up, their face swells up. More importantly, their airways swell up and that's what stops them breathing.

HELEN DALLEY: You can see it right there in front of your eyes?

SHANE TOWNSEND: Oh, it's happening right in front of your eyes.

HELEN DALLEY: Happens within, what?

SHANE TOWNSEND: Almost instantaneous.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: It was the most frightening thing I've ever seen. In some ways, I'm glad it almost happened with so many friends and family around because they were all able to experience how severe it is and it certainly changed their mindset.

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: I often describe anaphylaxis to parents as being a bit like an avalanche with the snow coming down the mountain and you really don't know where that snow is going to stop. It's difficult to tell when an anaphylactic reaction is developing whether or not it will be life-threatening. And if the snow is falling right down the mountain and is approaching the village, there comes a point when there's almost nothing you can do.

HELEN DALLEY: Tragically, some anaphylactic reactions are fatal.

CHERYL WHITBURN: Someone's missing. There's a big hole in our family, a huge hole in our family, and his name is Johnny.

HELEN DALLEY: Cheryl and John Whitburn lost their 15-year-old son, Johnny, six years ago, after a severe and rapid allergic reaction to a tiny amount of peanut he mistakenly ate.

JOHN WHITBURN: I lost my first wife through cancer, I lost my father, I lost my mother. That's nothing compared to what it's like to lose your son or a child, whether it be a son or a daughter. But losing anybody else is nowhere near. For all the world, Helen, somebody has put a hand inside you and just ripped it out.

HELEN DALLEY: Everything still must be so raw for you but can you believe that this was the outcome from eating a natural food, and maybe only eating the tiniest amount? SANDRA HEALY: Yes. It's just — It's just unbelievable. Life is so precious. And to be taken so suddenly.

HELEN DALLEY: Sandra and Greg Healy's 15-year-old daughter, Kareen, who suffered food allergies all her life, died during a game of her beloved touch footy, after an anaphylactic reaction to a shaving of peanut she, too, ate by mistake.

SANDRA HEALY: She actually went into respiratory failure but they did get her heart going again. But they said that she had been down too long. We didn't know at that time she had passed away there, at the ground. We were obviously hopeful that that wasn't the case.

HELEN DALLEY: As these families struggle with their grief, an overall picture of fatalities is difficult to pin down. Official figures on the number of anaphylactic deaths in Australia are not kept, but experts in the field say at least six people have died in the past five years in NSW alone. Several were children. And while deaths are rare, the incidents of severe food allergies is increasing.

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS, ALLERGY DEPT, CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL, WESTMEAD: We have quite a lot of evidence to suggest that, over the past 10-20 years, that the incidence of all allergic diseases has either doubled or tripled and food allergy is one of those disorders.

DR ROB LOBLAY, ALLERGY UNIT, RPA HOSPITAL: The anecdotal experience in our clinic and others is that 10 years ago we might have seen a handful of children with a peanut allergy in a year. In the last 4-5 years, we've seen a handful a week. It's suddenly shot up quite remarkably.

HELEN DALLEY: And those children with the most severe type of food allergy, exposing them to the risk of a life-threatening anaphylactic reaction, are also increasing.

DR SHANE TREVITHICK: 10 years ago, when I started working in emergency departments, I very rarely remember seeing an anaphylaxis. Over the last few years we've been seeing more and more. And about once every two or three weeks in the emergency department now we'd have someone who requires adrenaline to treat the symptoms of anaphylaxis.

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS: That incidence is now higher and we would regard food allergy to be as common as 3% to 5%.

HELEN DALLEY: So 3 to 5 in 100 children have a severe food allergy in this country?

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS: Yes, will have a food allergy and we're not sure of exactly what percentage actually are at risk of an anaphylaxis, but we regard about 3%, i.e., 3 in 100 children are having that type of food allergy.

HELEN DALLEY: That's 30 in every 1,000 children in Australia are at at risk of severe allergic reaction to a food. Alarming figures, particularly since many of us dismiss food allergies as nothing more serious than causing hives, sneezing or a bit of scratching.

SHANE TOWNSEND: There's a lot of ignorance out there. They're not aware of it because they haven't been confronted with it, or exposed to it, or know anyone that has got it. So, therefore, they tend to be bit blase about allergies in general.

HELEN DALLEY: And can you afford to be blase?

SHANE TOWNSEND: Definitely not.

HELEN DALLEY: Scientists admit they just don't know why allergies are on the rise, but they believe that, first, you must have a genetic predisposition to allergies, then our environment plays a major role.

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS: The environmental influences that are operating within our societies are such that they are actually driving the immune systems of young children down the allergic pathway.

HELEN DALLEY: In other words, infants are not getting the right bacteria to help their immune systems protect them from allergy. Even many medical practitioners continue to treat food allergy as the poor relation.

DR JANE PEAKE: I have a concern because many GPs, paediatricians, physicians, a lot of doctors, nurses, pharmacists, child health nurses don't have a lot of information about this. So a lot of misinformation is, unfortunately, given which can lead to children having more problems than are required and perhaps not having the appropriate treatment It's something the doctors are recognising they can no longer dismiss.

HELEN DALLEY: But Kelly Markam's experience illustrates a dangerous lack of knowledge among many doctors. When her 3-year-old, Chantelle, was just a year old, she had her first attack after eating toast dipped in egg.

KELLY MARKHAM: As soon as it touched her mouth, she swelled. I immediately grabbed the phone, rang the doctor. They said, "Ring an ambulance", which I did. Within 10 minutes, the ambulance had pulled up, she stopped breathing and they had to administer adrenaline through an injection.

HELEN DALLEY: So, within 10 minutes of her standing in front of you, she changed incredibly?

KELLY MARKHAM: Yes. She swelled to probably 10 times her size and broke out in hives.

HELEN DALLEY: When Kelly took Chantelle back to her GP she was stunned by his ignorance of what had caused her daughter's life-threatening attack.

KELLY MARKHAM: He had the report from the hospital and I explained to him again what had happened. He said to me, "You just fed her egg too early. "Take her home and feed her egg in six months."

HELEN DALLEY: While the GP missed it, Chantelle was eventually diagnosed as severely allergic to egg white.

KELLY MARKHAM: I knew people could get sick from food, I knew that people would vomit from food, but not that it could stop a person breathing.

HELEN DALLEY: You never knew that food could kill?

KELLY MARKHAM: No, until it happened to me.

HELEN DALLEY: Tracey and Richard Brinckman and their highly allergic little boy, Sam, also learned the hard way about the lack of allergy awareness among some of the medical profession.

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: He was eating dinner, he was sitting eating dinner, and he started coughing and then it escalated and escalated. We didn't know what was going on. So Richard ended up taking him to the GP.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: The GP thought he was choking and he was a bit alarmed because of the way he was struggling for breath. His first reaction was to start patting him on the back. That had no effect at all so, he soon grabbed Sam by the feet, hung him upside down, and shook him and shook him and shook him and shook him.

HELEN DALLEY: So baby Sam's true condition went undiagnosed. The GP didn't know what it was and, when Sam was rushed to hospital, doctors there were equally stumped.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: What they told us is, "We're not sure. "We thought he was choking, we've done the bronchoscopy. "We weren't really able to find anything."

HELEN DALLEY: After four emergency visits to hospital, Sam's condition was continually misdiagnosed as croup.

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: I asked if it could be an allergy and they ended up doing a blood test on him.

HELEN DALLEY: After a 5-month wait to see paediatric immunologist Dr Jane Peake Sam was then properly diagnosed.

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: He was allergic to egg as well as peanut and she said that I had to throw, basically, all the food out in my cupboard that contained egg or nut traces or nuts completely because it could possibly kill him. I suppose I walked out of her office thinking, "This is not that severe, he's fine. He's healthy."

HELEN DALLEY: Surely she's exaggerating?

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: Well, yeah.

HELEN DALLEY: Armed with the EpiPen, an auto-injecting dose of life-saving adrenaline, Richard was still to get the shock of his life at a family gathering.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: We were sitting at the table talking and I heard Sam's cough — that seal bark cough that he would get. Looked over — he's got a spoon with pavlova on it. So I've straight away kicked the chair over — "Oh my God, he's got some pavlova." And I've run over, picked him up and taken him up to the counter. Within about 30 seconds he started to turn blue.

HELEN DALLEY: Within 30 seconds?

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: It was almost immediately. Probably within another minute, Sam was completely blue from head to toe and couldn't breathe at all.

HELEN DALLEY: Richard grabbed the EpiPen and jabbed the adrenaline needle into Sam's thigh.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: He was completely limp and I was trying to shake him to not lose consciousness and I'm thinking that the EpiPen didn't work so I've quickly put him onto the floor to try and give him CPR. His tongue or throat or something was so swollen, no matter what I did, you couldn't get any air into him at all. I looked up at one stage to my friend, who was trying to help me, and there was a feeling of 'we're not going to win this'.

HELEN DALLEY: As Richard thought he was losing his son, the adrenaline started to take effect.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: It was miraculous. Sam just suddenly had a — (wheeze) — and he breathed a little bit. The feeling was tremendous and then he did it again. The colour started to come back into his skin. It was of the moments I'll never forget.

DR JANE PEAKE: He's one of those children that came close to not making it. And I think that if the father didn't have an EpiPen, I doubt Sam would be with us today.

HELEN DALLEY: Most of us don't understand a true allergy like young Sam's. While some people have minor attacks, anaphylaxis or a severe allergic reaction occurs when an allergen, like peanut protein, normally harmless, is ingested. The immune system goes into overdrive. Antibodies believe the allergen, represented here by the green spiky balls, is an enemy invader, and they trigger a major defensive reaction, releasing masses of chemicals into the tissues to try and protect the body, causing inflammation. That leads to the varying symptoms from itchiness, hives and, more dangerously, loss of blood pressure, swelling of the airways and passing out. Antihistamine drugs and adrenaline work to stop the reaction. But Richelle Townsend didn't have the benefit of such a life-saver as adrenaline.

SHANE TOWNSEND: No, no EpiPen. Never even heard of an EpiPen back then.

HELEN DALLEY: Richelle and her husband, Shane, knew she was asthmatic and peanut allergic, but 15 years ago EpiPen wasn't even available in Australia. They had no idea how severe an allergic attack could be till she had one.

SHANE TOWNSEND: When I first saw this allergy at her boss's place, it looked like she had done 12 rounds with Mike Tyson. You could hardly see her eyes, they were that swollen. Her face swelled up. She was like that way — took her about a week for it to go down.

HELEN DALLEY: Thinking her allergy was under control, the pair loved to eat out at Asian restaurants in Sydney's Newtown — Richelle always careful to avoid peanuts. But one night in 1991, with new baby Caitlin in tow, they ate in a Thai restaurant. Shane says he quizzed staff about their use of peanuts and peanut oil.

SHANE TOWNSEND: The maitre d, who came to the table, went back to the kitchen, came back, reassured us that this dish, this dish, this dish, did not contain peanuts. They did not cook with the peanut oil.

HELEN DALLEY: Despite assurances, Richelle somehow had just a trace of peanut, triggering a catastrophic reaction. Starting to feel unwell, her eyes puffing up, they left the restaurant.

SHANE TOWNSEND: She was pushing the stroller for a while there and said, "Can you take over?" And I thought, "Yeah, fine." I looked at her and said, "Are you OK?" And she said, "No, I'm not." And that's basically when she collapsed. Richelle was just going blue and was all puffed up and I just sort of ripped open her shirt and started putting breath into her and giving her CPR, with the help of my brother-in-law.

HELEN DALLEY: But Shane was unable to revive his adored wife and she was rushed to hospital.

SHANE TOWNSEND: I thought she was going to die. And now I wish she had of.

HELEN DALLEY: Richelle had finally emerged from her coma but irreparably damaged. She had been deprived of oxygen for too long.

SHANE TOWNSEND: I don't think she's got a quality of life. I don't think she ever has had a quality of life since that day. And her condition I would only describe as severely brain damaged.

HELEN DALLEY: Wheelchair-bound, fed through a tube, Richelle now lives in a nursing home. Shane says she hasn't heard her speak for 10 years. A young mother with her future before her, and a whole family's life shattered by anaphylaxis.

SHANE TOWNSEND: It's too hard watching the way she is. It's too hard watching the way my children react when she's there. And watching my in-laws grow old before their time. Sorry.

HELEN DALLEY: Tragically, the couple's two daughters, Caitlin and Keah, were too young to remember their mum as she was, but grew up with her as she is now.

CAITLIN TOWNSEND: It's probably been harder for him than, like, us because he knew her when she was well and seeing her go from being, like, one day she was perfect, everything was good, and the next day they go out and she's just in a coma. Sometimes the way people talk about her it's hard, because they talk about how good she used to be and how beautiful she was and how special she was.

KEAH TOWNSEND: We've never known her like that. We've only known her being in a wheelchair, like ...

CAITLIN TOWNSEND: Yeah.

HELEN DALLEY: The family sued the restaurant to cover the exorbitant costs of Richelle's constant medical care. The case took almost 10 years to get to court and was finally settled for an undisclosed amount. But apart from a compensation, Shane and Richelle's family had high hopes the celebrated case would wake people up to the potential devastation of food allergy.

SHANE TOWNSEND: I just thought that maybe through this that someone would pick up the ball and run with it, but it doesn't seem to have happened.

HELEN DALLEY: While support groups and specialists have tried to raise awareness in recent years, the message has simply not got through to the whole community. Just six years ago, teenager Johnny Whitburn and his parents knew little of the danger posed by his allergies.

CHERYL WHITBURN: It's like a nightmare. It's like — we seem to come up against a brick wall all the time when the information was there — we know now the information was there — but no-one bothered to sort of tell us what an anaphylactic reaction was.

HELEN DALLEY: According to his mum, Cheryl, as a baby, Johnny had shocking eczema, often closely associated with food allergy.

CHERYL WHITBURN: Johnny would wake 10-15 times a night, scratching, drawing blood and I'd have to be up to him and he just got worse.

HELEN DALLEY: At seven, he was finally diagnosed as allergic to many foods. His mother thoroughly eliminated them from his diet but she says it was still never explained to them what the consequences could be.

CHERYL WHITBURN: Unbelievable. More unbelievable that we didn't know — I cannot believe that all the specialists we went to couldn't say that it was possible for someone to have a reaction so severe that it would kill them.

HELEN DALLEY: No-one told you that?

CHERYL WHITBURN: No-one. No-one.

HELEN DALLEY: At 15, he was excited to go on work experience.

CHERYL WHITBURN: I packed his lunch for him, packed him a cheese sandwich, which he could have, and I said, "We'll see you tonight." We never saw him alive again.

HELEN DALLEY: Johnny joined the adults for take-away lunch, but instead of his plain, cheese sandwich, he ate fried rice with, mistakenly, a little bit of satay sauce on it.

CHERYL WHITBURN: Within half an hour, he said to his mate that he was with, "I'm getting hot." He tried to use his asthma spray. He said, "It's not working." And then he said, "Ring an ambulance." He must have known he was in trouble and then he basically dropped to the ground.

HELEN DALLEY: He dropped to the ground?

CHERYL WHITBURN: Dropped to the ground and that was it. That was it.

HELEN DALLEY: At first the hospital said it was an asthma attack, but it was later determined to be anaphylaxis, causing respiratory failure. Johnny had been without oxygen for too long and he died.

CHERYL WHITBURN: I, myself, felt so guilty because I feel as though I saved our son's life for 15 years but the day he got away from me, the first time he got away from me, we lost him. And I feel as though I should have tried to get more information but I don't know where I could have got it from, what I could have done than what we did. Because if we had of known he could have carried an adrenaline needle and maybe given it to himself, he would have been here today.

HELEN DALLEY: The Healy family also wants the community to fully understand the consequences of severe food allergy. SANDRA HEALY: It's a silent killer, I suppose. And that when mothers are crying out for help for the teachers, for their friends, for their friends' mothers for everyone, that they're not being paranoid, they're actually just trying to look after their children, and it's really hard for mums to let go because that's the risk. As soon as they let go, someone else is in control and you're never quite sure what the outcome is going to be. And Kareen was smart, she was clever, and she knew about her foods, so we don't understand what has happened here.

0HELEN DALLEY: While deaths from anaphylaxis are rare, both Kareen and Johnny were in the riskiest age group, teens, a time when total control over what a child eats or safe environments isn't always possible.

SANDRA HEALY: But as she was getting out and about, that was always fear. But I trusted her because she was always so pedantic with what she was putting in her mouth.

HELEN DALLEY: Kareen herself learnt to diligently avoid peanut, egg, fish. Sandra says she carried an adrenaline puffer when she was a child, but never needed to use it. She was healthy, active, seemed normal. But the family says they never knew an allergic reaction could kill and were never told about an EpiPen.

GREG HEALY: It's every parent's nightmare where your children have come through, they're on top of things. And to have that taken away, one, from our perspective but, two, from the child's perspective where they had so much ahead of them. It leaves a big, gaping hole, a void in the family.

SANDRA HEALY: There's no words that can truly describe the pain. You just wish that — you just hope and pray that no-one else that you know of goes through this.

HELEN DALLEY: While Kareen and Johnny did not have life-saving drugs on hand, for little William Neou, adrenaline and prompt medical help where his lifelines.

DR SHANE TREVITHICK: We gave him a lot of adrenaline — we used 10 times the dose we would normally use. It was the most dramatic save I've ever seen in 10 years in working in hospital medicine. I've never seen a child so close to death who we were able to resuscitate and have him normal five days later.

WILLIAM NEOU: I think I remember them putting pipes in my throat and that's all.

SOPHIA NEOU: After William get better, I'm very happy, very happy, that he survived and, after that, I've been more careful and also I teach William to be more careful.

HELEN DALLEY: Next Sunday, part two of our story reveals how ill-equipped are our health and education systems to cope with this growing public health crisis. DR ROB LOBLAY: I can see this tsunami of children heading in my direction as teenagers and adults, and I think we're going to be swamped with people who have got serious allergies as young adults.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: The saddest part, I think, what's going to take is some bad outcomes for people to start knowing how to rectify this problem, or how to address it, and I certainly wouldn't wish that upon anybody.

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"When food can be fatal: part two"
Transcript (15/05/2005)

ROKEYA RAHMAN: Everybody like him, everybody, children, the young and older — everybody like him.

HELEN DALLEY: It's just past the third anniversary of the day Siddiqur and Rokeya Rahman's 13 year-old son Hamidur died after a severely allergic or anaphylactic reaction during his Year 8 excursion.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: I am still proud, always proud about what he — what sort of person, what —

HELEN DALLEY: The family battled daily to come to terms with the searing grief of losing their son.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: It is impossible thing. I wish we can but it is no way any parents — not only me — any parents lost their kids, they can't do this. I need my son.

HELEN DALLEY: In recent weeks, Sunday has highlighted several cases where young Australians have died or lost all quality of life after an anaphylactic reaction to a simple food. There's the young mother now catastrophically brain damaged after eating at an Asian restaurant in Sydney, the teenaged boy who died after tasting a touch of satay sauce while on work experience and the 15 year-old girl who died in her mother's arms on the football field after mistakenly eating a shaving of peanut in a salad and this morning the Rahman family of Sydney also speak out for the first time, imploring the community to treat food allergy seriously. Like many children featured in our story, Hamidur Rahman suffered eczema, asthma and was severely food allergic. Never properly diagnosed with food allergies, his dermatologist, only giving him creams for his eczema, dismissed food as the cause. But Hamidur knew he got sick from peanuts and avoided them. As the school camp approached, Hamidur was apprehensive about the food but he felt prepared after he and his mum spoke to the teacher.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: She said I don't like —

ROKEYA RAHMAN: Peanut butter.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: Peanut butter. OK, we forget the peanut butter. We give you fantastic noodles.

ROKEYA RAHMAN: She said to me — do you give him any medication, puffer or something? I said yes, I give everything, I give his all medicine ...Ventolin.

HELEN DALLEY: The family believes meal time menus were changed for Hamidur but a trivia evening wasn't. During a Trivial Pursuit challenge, players tasted different foods. His parents, to this day, don't understand why but Hamidur tasted a teaspoonful of peanut butter a teacher handed him.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: He said he hold the jar and there's written peanut butter and Hamidur knows this is peanut butter and he ate it. This is — they blame Hamidur, my son.

ROKEYA RAHMAN: I can't believe it ... because he is very, very allergic, everything.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: He was very cautious.

ROKEYA RAHMAN: Because...the smell. You put in some peanut and if he smell it, he said "Oh Mum — I feel vomiting".

HELEN DALLEY: He became sick and went to the bathroom. While details are sketchy, Hamidur collapsed on the bathroom floor and was dead by the time an ambulance arrived. Later that night came the knock on the door at home every parent dreads.

ROKEYA RAHMAN: I say — where is Hamidur? He said — he's passed away ... My husband is running. I don't know, can't remember ...

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: Still I don't understand this thing. And I ask what happened? He said he ate peanut butter. I said,"How come? We informed the school."

HELEN DALLEY: The Rahmans say they've had little explanation since from Hamidur's school and a proposed coronial inquest still has not materialised, three years after their boy died.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: He passed away three years. I am still waiting for the truth. As a father, I don't know the truth and every time I try to go to school ask the questions what is the truth, they said to go to legal system. This is the answer.

SANDRA HEALY: I think the severity could have perhaps been explained to me a little bit more. We had no understanding that this would be where we would be sitting when she should have been 17 learning how to drive a car.

HELEN DALLEY: She would have been doing her HSC this year.

SANDRA HEALY: Yeah, HSC. Yeah, that's tough.

HELEN DALLEY: Sandra and Greg Healy, too, suffered the ultimate loss. Their 15 year-old, Corinne died after an anaphylactic reaction to just a shaving of peanut she unknowingly ate. Like the Rahmans, they too are stunned by the speed and ferocity of the killer reaction.

SANDRA HEALY: Once again, it's just a devastating shock — devastating mistake, I suppose, an accident that we don't fully understand, I suppose. So, it's difficult to try and cope with it.

HELEN DALLEY: The doctors had never led you down that path to thinking one day she could have a very severe reaction?

GREG HEALY: No, not at all. There had been no sign of it, no discussion about how acute this whole situation could be.

HELEN DALLEY: Like Corinne Healy, Hamidur Rahman was not carrying an EpiPen — containing a dose of life-saving adrenaline — and Siddiqur and Rokeya say they'd never even heard of one.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: None of doctor tell anything about the EpiPen. None of them. None of them.

HELEN DALLEY: The tragedy of Corinne's and Hamidur's deaths is they occurred only in recent years when much has been known by medical specialists and support groups about the deadly seriousness of anaphylaxis.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: And this is Hamidur's room. Hamidur used to live here and this is his ...

HELEN DALLEY: Yet the Healys, like the Rahmans, had so little information and the Rahmans claim their warning about peanuts went unheeded.

MARIA SAID, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, ANAPHYLAXIS AUSTRALIA: That child died because people weren't properly informed and if we've got the information here, we should be sharing it to prevent any further deaths.

SANDRA HEALY: If we can possibly help some mums and some families that they don't have go through this pain, that would be well worth what we're doing here now.

HELEN DALLEY: The community at large has remained ignorant about the severity of food allergies. Partly because governments have failed to treat anaphylaxis as a critical health problem and push the message far and wide.

MARIA SAID, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, ANAPHYLAXIS AUSTRALIA: Everyone's doing things in an ad hoc manner. Some governments are helping in different areas but we really need the federal and state government to really acknowledge this as a public health issue and to embrace it and then do what they can with organisations such as ASCIA.

HELEN DALLEY: With figures showing 30 in every 1,000 Australian children potentially at risk of a deadly allergic reaction, the need for concerted effort at the highest government level is obvious. Deaths are uncommon but the fact that the incidence of food allergies is increasing makes that need more urgent. Back as far as 1980, did peanut allergies exist, as far as we knew?

DR ROB LOBLAY, ALLERGY UNIT, ROYAL PRINCE ALFRED HOSPITAL, SYDNEY: They were very rarely reported so it was something that didn't appear on the radar screen until the late 1980s and that was when the first deaths started being recorded in North America.

HELEN DALLEY: Just why food allergies are on the rise is still uncertain but scientists believe that, along with a genetic predisposition, the so-called "hygiene theory" has much credibility. In other words, urbanised societies are too antiseptic.

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS, ALLERGY DEPARTMENT, CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL, WESTMEAD, SYDNEY: Industrialised, Western societies have become too clean. The immune system relies on exposure to certain microorganisms, bacteria, from birth onwards really and that when those influences are lacking, the infant's immune system lacks the ability to form the type of immune responses that would protect them from the development of allergic diseases.

HELEN DALLEY: Studies also show city children have much higher incidence of allergies than children from rural communities, particularly farms with animals.

DR ALYSON KAKAKIOS, ALLERGY DEPARTMENT, CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL, WESTMEAD, SYDNEY: They're exposed to a greater variety of micro-organisms earlier on. They're much more likely to be playing around in the dirt and also probably it comes also from the maternal microflora that they inherit because their mothers have also obviously been in the farming environment.

HELEN DALLEY: Another piece of the puzzle — you need exposure to the potential allergen.

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: Now, this might occur when your mother is pregnant with you, during breastfeeding or in early childhood but it needs to be at a time of your developing immune system.

DR ROB LOBLAY, ALLERGY UNIT, ROYAL PRINCE ALFRED HOSPITAL, SYDNEY: Probably the most important one, we suspect, is the presence of the food proteins coming out in the breast milk and we think that women have been eating more peanuts and other nuts in the last 10 or 15 years than they used to.

HELEN DALLEY: But while the scientists are still grappling with the reasons, governments and the community must deal with the reality.

MARIA SAID, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, ANAPHYLAXIS AUSTRALIA: It's really about anaphylaxis being acknowledged as a public health issue just like asthma or diabetes. Anaphylaxis is the new kid on the block but it's serious and we really need to work together to help minimise risk.

HELEN DALLEY: But with no uniform public health policy in place, every day hospital allergy clinics are dealing with the growing numbers of children suffering this affliction. These food allergic kids are being tested in a safe hospital environment to check how reactive they still are. Joel and Sam start having an allergic reaction with just a tiny taste of the allergen. The boys' immune systems start to go into overdrive believing the allergens are enemy invaders, their bodies launch a major defensive reaction, releasing masses of chemicals into their tissues, causing inflammation and other symptoms. Moderate reactions might see a child with itchiness, hives and nausea but other children can experience full anaphylaxis with dangerous loss of blood pressure and passing out. In the most severe cases, the airways swell, causing respiratory failure unless given adrenaline. The rise in food allergies has implications not only for governments but for schools, childcare centres, food manufacturers, the restaurant trade, even family kitchens. In other words, anyone who offers a safe environment where food is eaten.

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: When there is somebody who could potentially have a life-threatening reaction, that isn't something that we should be acting like the family are overreacting or being overprotective of their child. We should appreciate it for what it is and to protect that child from harm or from problems.

MARIA SAID, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, ANAPHYLAXIS AUSTRALIA: My concern is that we'll have a fatality like we have had, sadly, in NSW before NSW moved on with the development of guidelines for the management of anaphylaxis in schools. It shouldn't have to take the death of a child.

HELEN DALLEY: Although too late to help him, Hamidur's death did force the NSW Government to act. Previously, NSW health and education departments failed to agree on an anaphylactic policy for schools. Hamidur's death forced their hand but it still took almost two years before guidelines for all NSW schools were published. But the problem is the guidelines are not mandatory and it's left to each school to implement them or ignore them. Leanne Benson's daughter, Bronte, is so allergic, she just needs to touch or taste any nut to have a reaction. Such sensitivity terrifies her mother. What would be your greatest fear?

LEANNE BENSON: Collecting her from school in a box.

HELEN DALLEY: So you think about that?

LEANNE BENSON: Every day she goes to school. Every day.

HELEN DALLEY: In Bronte's first year of school last year, she had three serious anaphylactic reactions.

LEANNE BENSON: The last one was the last day of term, last day of school and she was rushed to hospital in an ambulance. Now, we can only pinpoint it to one of the other children bringing in a box of chocolates.

HELEN DALLEY: But Leanne feels Bronte's school still doesn't take it seriously enough. Despite assurances that all teachers are trained to use an EpiPen, when Bronte was in crisis, Leanne claims no-one used it.

LEANNE BENSON: She has an EpiPen with her at the school.

HELEN DALLEY: Did anyone administer it?

LEANNE BENSON: No-one administered it which was really annoying. If in doubt, just give it to her because it will save her life.

HELEN DALLEY: The school did stop selling peanut butter sandwiches but Leanne feels the onus is still on her to protect her daughter.

LEANNE BENSON: The school has asked me to do their policy for them. The school has asked me to do their management plan for them.

HELEN DALLEY: How do you feel about that?

LEANNE BENSON: Let down. And I expect my child to be in a safe environment but they can't provide that for Bronte.

HELEN DALLEY: Brisbane's Brinckman family admit they were blase about little Sam's allergies to peanut and egg until they nearly lost him when he ate a skerrick of pavlova.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: There was the time we needed — he was gone. He had completely stopped breathing. It had been a long time. Blue's not the right word, he was purple. And then he came back and it was only due to that EpiPen.

HELEN DALLEY: The adrenaline saved him but as Sam approaches school age, Tracey and Richard say they're filled with fear.

RICHARD BRINCKMAN: We've been talking to principals and that of schools who all say they'll do their best, they have other children there with allergies and that sort of thing but there's nothing they can really guarantee you. They can't tell you that nothing's going to happen. "He may die here," was actually the words they used.

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: I'm terrified. If Sam's sitting there and there's a kid beside him that says, "Hey, mate, do you want a piece of chocolate ?" He's still only five and he's a kid and the thought that if he takes it, it could kill him, in reality.

HELEN DALLEY: While home schooling has been suggested to them, they don't think Sam should have to miss out on mainstream school life

TRACEY BRINCKMAN: I think schools probably need to look at it a bit more seriously because the illness that Sam has is a serious one.

HELEN DALLEY: Kelly Markham says her daughter Chantelle suffered an anaphylactic reaction causing her to stop breathing just 10 minutes after tasting egg. She had to be revived by adrenaline from an ambulance officer

KELLY MARKHAM: Absolutely terrifying to hold your child in our arms while she's basically dying in front of you. It's just terrifying.

HELEN DALLEY: So when Chantelle was starting preschool in Brisbane, Kelly began preparing to make the whole centre safe for her daughter.

KELLY MARKHAM: Basically it meant no egg sandwiches. No biscuits containing egg or egg white, no mayonnaise, sticky things like that.

HELEN DALLEY: That might have egg in them?

KELLY MARKHAM: That might have egg in them. HELEN DALLEY: While most parents and centre management were fully supportive, Kelly was shocked by a couple of parents' reaction to being asked not to bring egg to the preschool.

KELLY MARKHAM: I actually copped quite a lot of abuse. HELEN DALLEY: Really? What sort of abuse?

KELLY MARKHAM: Just that I was neurotic and, you know, like I actually tried to explain to this woman what may happen to my child in an anaphylactic reaction and she said to me, "You don't need to lecture me on death," I was terrified that, you know, another mother that didn't understand would cause a reaction in my child and with anaphylaxis you never know if that reaction's going to be fatal.

HELEN DALLEY: Sheena Cole did manage to find some Sydney preschools and schools who are now stand-out role models on the management of anaphylaxis in schools.

SHEENA COLE: It tended to be, and it's got to be, I think, a real collaborative effort so it really was a matter of me working with the school at all times.

HELEN DALLEY: Her daughter Courtney had allergies to fish, nuts and egg. So with full support from SCEGGS Darlinghurst Primary, Sheena helped the school become a safe environment.

LIZ CUMMING, PRINCIPAL — SCEGGS DARLINGHURST PRIMARY SCHOOL: Anaphylaxis is — there is nothing wrong with this little girl, she just has a condition that we need to care for her just like many children have special needs and we always do our best to help them.

SHEENA COLE: Really it's not just the staff and myself, it's the other parents as well.

LIZ CUMMING, PRINCIPAL — SCEGGS DARLINGHURST PRIMARY SCHOOL: We sent that letter to all the parents in the school, from kindergarten to Year 12, explaining why we were going to be peanut butter-free and pure nut product-free. Out of the over 850 parents, I received one phone call only. That was from a dad who actually questioned the right of the school for us to be telling them what their children could eat. When I explained that the right of the school was that we had a right to make SCEGGS a safe place for every child who comes to the school, he absolutely understood and I thought one parent out of 850 plus was pretty good.

HELEN DALLEY: NSW state school Coogee Public also believes it has a duty of care to provide a safe haven for food-allergic children.

LYNDA WARD, RELIEVING PRINCIPAL, COOGEE PUBLIC SCHOOL, SYDNEY: The photos are in each classroom, in the canteen, in the office, all over the school so that the children are easily identified. Each child has a medication bag in the classroom but there's a duplicate supply of whatever they need in the office so that wherever they happen to be, if they did have a reaction, the medicine — the medication is accessible.

HELEN DALLEY: Coogee Public has no less than eight allergic children who all need individual management plans with all teachers and carers understanding who they are and what needs be done in an emergency.

LYNDA WARD, RELIEVING PRINCIPAL, COOGEE PUBLIC SCHOOL, SYDNEY: At school, there hasn't been an incident that's required medication. I think it's a lot of good management. It's probably a little bit of luck thrown in there as well but certainly it's because we've faced the problem head-on and dealt with it in a very pro-active way.

HELEN DALLEY: So do you think it's just imperative for schools to treat this as a very serious issue?

LIZ CUMMING, PRINCIPAL — SCEGGS DARLINGHURST PRIMARY SCHOOL: Definitely. I also think we don't have any choice in the matter. What would you do if a child has a reaction at school? Something has to happen immediately. There isn't time to call parents or for parents to come in to administer any medication so I see it as something where we have no choice.

HELEN DALLEY: But as the education system tries to play catch-up, the health system is struggling to cope with the growing needs of anaphylactic children.

DR ROB LOBLAY, ALLERGY UNIT, ROYAL PRINCE ALFRED HOSPITAL, SYDNEY: I think the allergy services are going to be strained, severely strained as a result. All my adult colleagues I don't think fully appreciate this because they haven't seen the children coming through the system who are going to be seeing them in a few years time. So I don't think they're fully prepared for what's going to hit them — a tidal wave of children coming in their direction as teenagers with peanut allergies.

HELEN DALLEY: At least NSW, Victoria, SA and WA have public allergy clinics for proper diagnosis and testing in several hospitals but in Queensland, resources are in dire need.

DR PETE SMITH, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: There are no allergists working in public hospitals in Queensland. There is no public allergy clinic. There is no training opportunities for general paediatricians to learn allergy or even specialists in skin conditions, respiratory conditions. It's a disaster amplifying itself for future generation. The black parts show the airway and this is airway here. This is a bit of the vocal cord, it's all swollen up here.

HELEN DALLEY: Allergist Dr Pete Smith is one of only two paediatric allergy specialists servicing the entire State of Queensland.

DR PETE SMITH, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: That's shaking as a result of an allergic reaction. There's a desperate need for basic infrastructure because nothing exists. The Government is being lobbied and so far it's shuffling papers without action.

HELEN DALLEY: With no public services, that means long waiting lists to see the two private practitioners.

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: My waiting time's over a year and I think I'd be horrified —

HELEN DALLEY: That's appalling.

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: I think I'd be horrified if I turned up to get a doctor's appointment and I was given one for a year's time. Patients come and see me from all over the state of Queensland. I also have some from the Northern Territory and from northern NSW and a lot of families ring and just express how desperate they are to see a specialist in this area.

HELEN DALLEY: So what do you think needs to be done about that?

DR JANE PEAKE, PAEDIATRIC IMMUNOLOGIST: Well, I think that the most important thing is to train more people that can provide serves.

HELEN DALLEY: Parents of anaphylactic children are urgently calling on the Queensland Government to act.

KELLY MARKHAM: We desperately need specialised health resources for allergies and people with anaphylaxis. They desperately need a public allergy clinic set up in the hospitals of Sydney and Melbourne. And there needs to be really a public education campaign about anaphylaxis as well.

HELEN DALLEY: For families with severely allergic children, it's not just about coping with the condition but managing their whole lifestyle. Many families report they miss out on simple pleasures like eating out or playing with friends in order to stay safe. This weekly play group with all allergic children is one activity the mums know is food safe.

KATE CHAPLIN: This is completely out for my family, all of these dairy products.

HELEN DALLEY: Even food shopping can be fraught.

KATE CHAPLIN: No cow's milk, no nice creamy desserts.

HELEN DALLEY: Checking every label and dismissing goods containing an allergen.

KATE CHAPLIN: Can you put that away for mummy, darling?

HELEN DALLEY: Kate Chaplin's 7 year-old, Justine, is allergic to egg, dairy, sesame seed, banana, latex and nut. So at seven, has Justine ever had a milk shake?

KATE CHAPLIN: No.

HELEN DALLEY: She's never had ice-cream?

KATE CHAPLIN: No.

HELEN DALLEY: She's never had a boiled egg?

KATE CHAPLIN: No!

HELEN DALLEY: And certainly she doesn't have nuts.

KATE CHAPLIN: Or chocolate.

HELEN DALLEY: So she's missed out on a lot of those normal foods that kids eat?

KATE CHAPLIN: Yes.

HELEN DALLEY: Kate has educated all those close to her but most of all she needs to educate Justine about what might be ahead with her.

KATE CHAPLIN: My issue is my daughter's life and my issue is having her grow up and be a member of society that can contribute something safely and have a long, happy life. She's got so much love to give. I want her to enjoy life and that worries me.

HELEN DALLEY: There is some good news. Many children will grow out of most allergies by the end of primary school although figures show 80% of children with peanut allergy are not so lucky and will live with it forever. But Sandra and Greg Healy have no such optimism. Their daughter Corinne's future was wiped out by anaphylaxis.

SANDRA HEALY: You know, it's a silent killer, I suppose and when mothers are crying out for help for the teachers, for their friends, for their friends' mothers, for everyone — that they're not being paranoid. They are actually trying to look after for their children and it really is hard for the mums to let go.

HELEN DALLEY: So too, Cheryl and John Whitburn's teenage son Johnny who died of an anaphylactic reaction soon after mistakenly eating a bit of satay sauce.

CHERYL WHITBURN: I'm frightened when these kids, children which are young now, are all going to become teenagers in the next five or whatever years and they're going to get out of their parents' sight. Now, if they're warned and they're told how dangerous it can be, they have a chance. But they need to be told.

HELEN DALLEY: Shane Townsend and his daughters also robbed of a loving wife and mother who now lives in a wheelchair, severely brain-damaged thanks to a touch of peanut she ate at a restaurant.

SHANE TOWNSEND: It's just been too hard. It's too hard watching the way she is. It's too hard watching the way my children react when she's there. And watching my in-laws grow old before their time. Sorry.

HELEN DALLEY: And Siddiqur and Rokeya Rahman who feel they face a bleak future indeed without their little boy to share it.

SIDDIQUR RAHMAN: I want to know what the truth is. I want to know the truth, the story. Doesn't matter whose fault was it. I want to know. The second thing I want to know — no parents suffer like me.

HELEN DALLEY: All these families ask for is more compassion and above all awareness. They say their children and loved ones, whose lives were cut short by anaphylaxis, are owed nothing less.

"When food can be fatal: Update"
Transcript (September 18, 2005)

Reporter : Helen Dalley
Producer : Ann Buchner

Despite growing community awareness about the dangers of severe food allergies, Australian children continue to die from preventable acute allergic reactions known as anaphylaxis. This week Sunday reveals for the first time the tragic story of four-year-old Alex Baptist who died a year ago from anaphylactic shock in a Melbourne pre-school, even though he was carrying life-saving medication.

Earlier this year, Sunday spoke exclusively to the parents of Hamidur Rahman — a 13-year-old who also died from an allergic reaction to peanut butter while attending a school camp three years ago. The family were bewildered how this tragedy could have happened when they say they informed the school that their teenaged son couldn't eat peanuts.

Following an inquest into Hamidur Rahman's death last week, NSW Deputy State Coroner Jacqueline Milledge recommended there must be proper training of all staff and students in the state's schools and childcare centres about the risks of food allergies and correct emergency treatment of acute reactions. All this is cold comfort to Alex Baptist's parents who believe their son would still be alive today if proper training of childcare staff had been widely available in Victoria at the time of his death ...

This week marks one year since young Alex Baptist died after an anaphylactic — or severely allergic — reaction, while attending his local kindergarten. It's suspected the vibrant four-and-a-half-year old inadvertently came into contact with the merest trace of peanuts - a food that's harmless to most of us, but enough to send his nut-allergic little body into a rapid spiral towards death

When Alex was a toddler he had been properly diagnosed by an allergy clinic as potentially anaphylactic to peanuts. He was prescribed an Epi-pen — containing a life-saving adrenaline dose — that was to be administered immediately if he showed any symptoms of an allergic reaction.

During an acute anaphylactic reaction, the victim's blood pressure drops and their tongue and throat swell, blocking the airways and leading to death by suffocation and heart failure. Quickly administering adrenalin in the early stages of a reaction can reverse these deadly symptoms.

What's frightening about Alex's story is that once they understood the potential severity of Alex's allergy, the family did what medical experts told them would keep their child safe. Indeed when Alex had his reaction late last year, much was known in the community about preventing anaphylaxis. Alex never left home without his Epi-pen and his parents Martha and Nigel told everyone who came in contact with their son that exposure to the merest trace of peanuts could potentially kill him.

While their home state of Victoria was woefully lax in forcing schools and pre-schools to adopt proper management plans and carer training for anaphylaxis, the Baptists' kindergarten supported Nigel and Martha's vigilance and only allowed fruit to come into the centre. An allergy Action Plan — clearly detailing what to do if Alex had a reaction, swelled up or stopped breathing — was prominently displayed in the kinder and the family says they were assured the teachers were properly trained to use an Epi-pen.

But on the day of Alex's severe reaction things went horribly wrong. Nigel and Martha believe somehow Alex was exposed to peanut butter and that child-care staff failed to administer his life-saving adrenalin.

Martha Baptist told Sunday that Alex became distressed and had trouble breathing in the playground soon after eating morning tea. He collapsed and lost consciousness — showing characteristic symptoms of an acute allergic reaction. Martha Baptist says she was told that when a teacher went to administer Alex's Epi-pen, the teacher accidentally jabbed into her finger instead: "We don't believe that Alex got his adrenalin," said Martha.

But what shatters Alex's parents is that they believe a second attempt was not made to administer adrenalin belonging to another child at the kindergarten. "It does concern us because there was another Epi-pen in the cupboard and a decision was made not to give that to Alex," said Martha Baptist.

Alex's grief stricken father Nigel said: "It's just so hard for us to comprehend; you know that anyone could not give it to our Alex who was there lying, dying on the floor."

Despite receiving CPR from teachers at the kindergarten, Alex had stopped breathing by the time an ambulance arrived and could not be revived.

Michael Vassili, a lawyer acting for the Baptist family, believes that kindergarten staff on duty that day had not been adequately trained to manage the crisis: "Anyone who was properly trained would know that that child needed adrenalin, he needed the Epi-pen immediately. If there was an Epi-pen there, proper training would have guided the appropriate person to the Epi-pen and it would have been administered."

Dr Rob Loblay, head of the RPA Hospital Allergy Clinic, believes the events surrounding Alex Baptist's death highlight a common concern among child-carers and teachers faced with treating an anaphylactic reaction — "'Am I legally liable if I use an Epi-pen when it hasn't been prescribed, or use another child's Epi-pen'. These are unfounded fears and so we need to sort of address that issue as well."

The Baptists believe an inquest is the only way they will learn the truth about their son's death and prevent a similar tragedy happening to another Victorian family. Indeed it is only after a full Coronial Inquiry into the death of in NSW school boy Hamidur Rahman that the full details of Hamidur's death have been revealed.

Four months ago, Siddiqur and Rokeya Rahman spoke exclusively to Sunday about the loss of their 13-year-old son Hamidur while he was attending a school camp. Last week Siddiqur and Rokeya Rahman attended the Glebe Coroners Court in Sydney, to hear the grim news of why their beloved son died from peanut anaphylaxis.

The Rahmans had known Hamidur was allergic to peanuts all his life. He never ate them, but they said they'd never been told by doctors or health practitioners how serious it could be, and knew nothing of Epi-pens.

While the school was informed Hamidur couldn't eat peanuts at camp, the Deputy Coroner expressed her shock that this information was not passed onto the teachers on duty the night he died, after tasting peanut butter given to him by a teacher during a game.

When Hamidur collapsed moments later, at first teachers were unaware that they were dealing with the catastrophic symptoms of anaphylaxis. Despite valiant efforts by teachers to save his life, there was no life saving adrenalin on hand and Hamidur died before an ambulance could get him proper medical treatment.

To ensure such preventable tragedies never happen again, last week the Coronial findings recommended:

Unfortunately at the time of his death, Hamidur Rahman, his family or his school had no idea of how potentially fatal his food allergy could be. Hamidur had never been prescribed the life-saving Epi-pen and the school boy stood little chance against a rapid anaphylactic reaction. But what crushes Nigel and Martha Baptist is they took all the preventative steps they could, but still couldn't save their little Alex. They implore state and federal governments to do more to protect allergic children.

"Please do something about this, don't ignore Alex's death, he is worth more than that, "said Martha Baptist. "Don't ignore the other children out there with food allergies, please help them and help their parents make life safer for them. We can't recover from this; we'll never get over this. Our hearts will always be aching for him."