I just got a letter back from DOT, Norman Strickman, Chief Aviation Consumer Protection Division Office of Aviation Enforcement and Proceedings. The following sentences were very disappointing: "Section 372 of that acts states that none of the funds available under the act may be used to implement, carry out, or enforce any regulation or other law that requires or encourages an air carrier, on intrastate or interstate air transportation, to provide a peanut-free buffer zone or any other related peanut restricted area or to restrict the distribution of peanuts....I can assure you that the Department intends to comply fully with the requirements of this recently enacted legislation, which supercedes the position taken of our office on this issue in our August 12, 1998, letter to the 10 largest U.S. certificated carriers. We note, however, that carriers remain free to accomodate passengers with severe peanut allergies as the carriers see fit."
It also notes that the "funding restriction on enforcement cannot be lifted until 90 days after submission to the Congress and the Secretary of a peer-reviewed scientific study that determines that there are severe reactions by passengers to peanuts as a result of contact with very small peanut particles of the kind that passengers might encounter in an aircraft."
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Keep posting your stories about airborne reactions, also send letters to the AAAAI, DOT, etc.
Together, we can make a difference!
<p>I just got the same letter from the DOT yesterday. It was dissapointing, but not surprising. I'm hopeful that testing of airborne reactions will be carried out soon to show that those that are exquisitely sensitive can react via that route.</p>