It was the kiss of death

New York Daily News
by Derek Rose

A 15-year-old Canadian girl with a peanut allergy died last week after smooching with her boyfriend, who had just eaten a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Christina Desforges died in a Quebec hospital on Wednesday after doctors were unable to revive her, hospital officials said yesterday.

She went into anaphylactic shock last weekend, after the kiss, and was almost immediately given a shot of adrenaline, but it was too late.

"It's a very sad event," Chicoutimi school official Michel Cloutier told the Edmonton Journal. Her classmates "are feeling emotional and we had them meet with a psychologist."

Peanut allergies account for 50 to 100 deaths annually in the United States, said Dr. Jonathan Field, director of the pediatric allergy and asthma clinic at NYU and Bellevue medical centers.

"I wish I could say it's shocking, but we do hear cases of it," he said. "We've had it from mouth-to-mouth contact, or even eating off a surface with peanut residue. It can be minute, minute quantities."

As many as 1 in 200 Americans have a peanut or tree nut allergy, according to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Severe allergic reactions can develop quickly and without warning.