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When it might be a severe allergic reaction

For people in the United States who have a serious allergy to a food, a sting, a medicine or latex; for the mother, father, husband, wife, friend, teacher or coworker beside them; and for anyone who may one day be standing next to a person whose throat is closing. A severe allergic reaction (anaphylaxis): the signs, and what to do. Helping someone else. After the epinephrine. What anaphylaxis is. Carrying epinephrine, and a written plan. Food and labels. Stings, medicines and latex. Babies, children and school. Paying for epinephrine. Work. Finding help. And the words to say when you call or write. No quiz and no score. One thing at a time.

A word with a dotted line under it, like this, opens its official definition, quoted from a U.S. government glossary.

This page and its wording were written with AI (Claude) for Scarlet Beast (our AI policy). The facts come from pages read on October 2, 2026: MedlinePlus, from the U.S. National Library of Medicine (Anaphylaxis; Food Allergy; Allergies; and Insect Bites and Stings: the summaries); the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (Food Allergies; Food Allergies: What You Need to Know; and Have Food Allergies? Read the Label); the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Food Allergies in Schools; and one sentence of Possible Side Effects from Vaccines); the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (Food Allergy; Causes and Prevention of Food Allergy; Characterizing Food Allergy & Addressing Related Disorders; and the index page of its guidelines); Food Allergy Research & Education (Recognizing and Treating Reaction Symptoms; Anaphylaxis; its Emergency Care Plan page; Know Your Rights; and its contact page); the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (Anaphylaxis); the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (Anaphylaxis); the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America (Severe Allergic Reaction: Anaphylaxis; Anaphylaxis Action Plan; Drug Assistance Programs; and its contact page) and its division Kids with Food Allergies (Helping Students Manage Food Allergies at School); and the Job Accommodation Network (Allergies; Food Allergy; and its contact page). The description of Crisis Text Line is from its own front page, read the same day. Food Allergy Research & Education, the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, the two allergy societies and Crisis Text Line are private organisations describing themselves; we have no connection with any of them. We did not call or text any line, contact any provider, program or group, or search any directory. We did not read any clinical guideline, any drug or device label, any device’s instructions, any first aid manual, any law or regulation, any state’s school or epinephrine rules, what any insurance plan pays for, or the research behind any statement; where the page touches one of these, it says so. We did not use the MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia’s page on anaphylaxis: it is licensed from a private company whose notice forbids copying or reworking it. Where two sources word the same thing differently, the page reports both. Changed on October 14, 2026: the page used to pass on lines from a page of the American Academy of Pediatrics (Anaphylaxis in Infants & Children, on HealthyChildren.org), among them its steps for after the epinephrine and its signs in children. Its terms do not allow its content to be used with AI tools, so those lines are out, and the page links it without a summary. MedlinePlus’s anaphylaxis page was read again that day. Changed on October 15, 2026: the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America’s terms do not allow its online material to be copied or republished without its written permission, and Kids with Food Allergies is part of it. The lines that followed their wording closely, among them the signs in babies and toddlers, the written plan, the school steps, the kinds of help with cost and the online community, are now short descriptions in our own words, with links to their pages. The page has no questionnaire and gives no score, on purpose: a list is not an assessment. It names epinephrine, because every source does, and names no brand of it, no other medicine and no dose. It quotes no named person, and gives no figures for how common allergies are; the sources have them, with their context. Lines marked “Ours” are our own suggestions. This page saves nothing: no account, no cookies, nothing you tick is stored or sent, and no analytics (privacy). Scarlet Beast is not a clinic or a government agency, and takes no money from anyone named here. Found a mistake? Email [email protected].