Teen Dies After Eating Chips Ahoy Cookie, Grieving Mother Told She Got What She Deserved
“Our hearts are broken and we are still in shock. Our whole lives we dedicated to keeping our child safe from one ingredient, peanuts.”
That is how Kellie Travers-Stafford began her heartbreaking Facebook post explaining how her 15-year-old daughter, Alexi, died from an honest mistake.
On June 25, 2018, Alexi, who was severely allergic to peanuts, went to a friends house and while there reached for what she thought was a simple chocolate chip cookie: a chewy Chips Ahoy.
She recognized the red packaging and because of previous investigation, knew that the original chewy Chips Ahoy did not contain peanuts. She ate one of the cookies in the red package that had the tab pulled up, assuming that the cookie was “safe.”
It turned out to be a fatal mistake.
The cookies were actually chewy Chips Ahoy made with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, but the packaging was so similar that the teen didn’t notice the subtle differences that pointed to the common allergen that was inside.
Alexi felt tingling inside of her mouth and immediately went home. Her symptoms worsened quickly.
The 15-year-old began to go into anaphylactic shock and her parents administered 2 EpiPen Auto-Injectors while they waited for paramedics to arrive. She eventually went unconscious and even stopped breathing.
It only took 90 minutes for the peanuts to take her life.
“As a mother who diligently taught her the ropes of what was okay to ingest and what was not, I feel lost and angry because she knew her limits and was aware of familiar packaging, she knew what ‘safe’ was,” the grieving mother wrote.
She continued, “A small added indication on the pulled back flap on a familiar red package wasn’t enough to call out to her that there was ‘peanut product’ in the cookies before it was too late.”
She shared this vulnerable post in hopes to bring awareness to other parents of children with food allergies and to encourage the company to make some packaging changes.
While she did receive a good amount of support form those in the social media world, an alarming amount of people told her that her daughter got what she deserved.
Some claimed that the 15-year-old should have checked the packaging closer. Others even went as far as to say that it was an example of natural selection.
According to Robyn Charron on JenniferMargulis.net, every 20th comment on Travers-Stafford’s post put the blame on her teenage daughter.
Even the Nabisco brand didn’t show any sign of remorse.
They tweeted, “We take allergens very seriously. Chewy Chips Ahoy! made w/ Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups packaging clearly shows that it contains peanuts through words and visuals. Package color indicates Chewy, Chunky, or Original. Consumers should always read the label for allergy information.”
Twitter user, Keren Deberg, responded with a picture of the different packaging that Nabisco claims “clearly shows” that certain products contain peanuts.
“That is not clearly at all!! I agree we should all read labels but your customers include children and you should be smarter and care more about their safety. Take a look at this picture,” she wrote.
Travers-Stafford’s Facebook post was a grieving mother’s way to bring awareness to the dangers of the similarly packaged products for children with severe allergies.
While she did receive support, she also unfairly received hate-filled messages from people who don’t understand what living with a life-threatening allergy is truly like, something no grieving mother should have to endure.
Do you think Nabisco should consider changing their packaging to make their products that contain allergens like peanuts more distinctive?
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