"This experience is a true turning point in my life. Before that Christmas, life was a lighthearted matter to me, something to be valued but not necessarily treasured. I now know how fragile life is. I know how important it is to get the most out of every day I can, because I never know which day will be my last."
- Becki Warden, Christmas 1989
Danger lurked in nearly every morsel of food Becki Warden ate.
Eating was a matter of life and death for Becki because of allergies to several foods, particularly nuts. She scrutinized what she ate and pored over food labels, searching for ingredients that could send her into anaphylactic shock and possibly cause death.
In the end, all the care was for naught.
Becki, 16, died Saturday, a week after eating a candy bar that probably contained a tiny amount of an ingredient she was allergic to but that was not listed on the label.
Becki and a friend stopped by a convenience store on the way home from a date just after midnight on Sept. 13. She bought a candy bar, a type she'd eaten before with no problem.
But after several bites of the candy, Becki began to feel sick. Her date rushed Becki home, where her mother, Frances, tried to give Becki a lifesaving shot of adrenaline in hopes of staving off full-blown anaphylactic shock.
It was too late. Becki was unconscious by the time paramedics reached the Warden home. She suffered massive brain damage and was comatose during the week she spent at the hospital.
In the wake of their daughter's death, Robert and Frances Warden have launched a campaign to prevent the same thing from happening to someone else's child.
They want food labeling laws changed to list even traces of the handful of ingredients that commonly cause allergic reactions - milk, eggs, wheat, peanuts, soy and nuts. The Food and Drug Administration now requires only ingredients that make up more than 2 percent of a product to be listed on the label.
That leaves people like Becki exposed to danger, the Wardens say.
"To use that is like saying you could have up to 2 percent cyanide, because that is what it was to Becki - poison," said Frances Warden.
They want food manufacturers and handlers to be more aware of the potential for "cross over" during food preparation - traces of substances being inadvertently mixed through the use of shared utensils and equipment.
Parents of children with food allergies also need Lamaze-style training on how to save their children if they experience a severe reaction, the Wardens say.
"If I'd had CPR training and a little above, I could have prevented it," said Frances Warden.
The Wardens have created a foundation in Becki's name at Valley Bank and Trust Co. in Orem. They plan to use the money raised to give other parents emergency response training.
And, the Wardens would like a category created for food allergies in the International Classification of Disease. Those deaths now get lumped under such headings as brain death or cardiac arrhythmia, which makes tracking statistics on food allergy deaths impossible.
About 2 percent of adults and 5 percent of children have food allergies, said Anne Munoz-Furlong, founder of the Food Allergy Network. Reactions that result in death are rare, however, according to Hugh A. Sampson, a pediatric allergist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Md.
Becki was 13 months old when her parents discovered her allergy. She had taken a bite of a Brazil nut and began exclaiming "hot," Frances Warden said. Hives broke out over her body.
Becki learned to stay away from nuts and several other foods. It was the seemingly safe products that started causing problems.
On Christmas 1989, Becki, who was 14, and her family had a brush with death. She ate an imported candy bar and went into anaphylactic shock. Nuts weren't listed on the wrapper, but the family later learned the company also made a nut candy bar and suspect the ingredient crossed over.
Becki spent three days in a coma in the intensive-care unit at the hospital.
"We envisioned her going through life and never eating anything wrong again," Frances Warden said. "None of us wanted to realize how fragile her life was."
Becki realized another coma and brain death were possible; she agreed to be an organ donor in the event that happened. The Wardens estimate that up to 50 people will benefit from Becki's last act of generosity.
"Although we didn't get the personal miracle we prayed for, it's a great comfort to know that about 3 p.m. Saturday phones began ringing across Utah and the nation and they got news that their miracle was happening," said Robert Warden.