Latex Allergy and Balloons Are Dangerous for UK Woman
For Rachel Johnson, an occupational therapist at a UK hospital, an innocuous encounter with balloons led to a trip to the emergency room according to Evening News 24 in the UK.
Her wheezing and runny nose and eyes made it necessary for a shot of anti-histamine. According to the article, one-percent of the population develops a latex allergy during the course of their lifetime.
Mrs. Johnson told Evening News 24: “It is a life-threatening condition and really quite scary. The first time it happened I was lucky because I was at the hospital so I could get immediate help.”
Though much of the public is unaware of the sensitivity that certain people have for latex, the hospital in which Mrs. Johnson works had already banned balloons within hospital grounds as well as the use of latex gloves.
Mrs. Johnson says that though her place of work is great about understanding the seriousness of a latex allergy, she keeps a ventilator and medication with her at all times.
The article points out that latex is actually “sap” from rubber plants and that the Natural Rubber Latex is different from Synthetic Latex rubber which is made from such products as petroleum products.
Allergies caused by chemicals that are used to process natural or synthetic latex is called a rubber chemical allergy. Sensitivity to proteins that are in natural latex is known as a latex allergy.
September 9, 2008 – 4:25 pm