A Toronto woman is demanding more clarity on food packaging labels, following the tragic loss of her partner after consuming a dessert from Crumbl Cookies in Ajax, Ontario.
Shyhien Cousins and her partner, 29-year-old Adeva Brown-Geddes, settled down for a sweet treat from the bakery on the night of Jan. 3. Brown-Geddes had taken a bite of a Monster ft. M&M Candies cookie before immediately feeling symptoms of an itchy throat, which quickly escalated to bloodshot eyes, hyperventilation and vomiting.
“She asked me to go grab her puffer… she took a puff of her puffer, and it wasn’t enough… she asked us to dial 911, and I could see that she needed air, and she wasn’t getting any air,” Cousins told Now Toronto.
Looking through the ingredients of the cookie, Cousins soon had a devastating realization – it contained peanuts, an ingredient Brown-Geddes was severely allergic to.
After Brown-Geddes collapsed in her arms, Cousins proceeded to perform CPR for seven minutes before EMS arrived. On route to the hospital, she says her heart stopped for a total of 30 minutes. Following seven days in ICU, Brown-Geddes succumbed to the complications of the anaphylactic reaction on Jan. 11.
Crumbl Cookies describes the Monster ft. M&M’s Candies cookie as a “warm peanut butter dream” which not only contains M&M’s, but also peanut butter chips.
Now Toronto reached out to Crumbl Cookies for comment, but did not receive a response by time of publication.
Cousins, who ordered the cookie through Crumbl’s app to avoid lengthy lines at the recently opened storefront, says there was no clear labelling that the cookie contained nuts when placing the order. After reaching out to the store’s franchise owner, who she described as acting “defensive,” Cousins wants people, especially those with allergies, to be more careful with the food they consume.
“I would want awareness for everybody else, to at least have a peanut on the box, like how other brands do it, or just to have more clarification with the cookies and the name of it. I wouldn’t know that a Monster M&M contains peanuts from just the title when ordering from the app,” Cousins explained.
Brown-Geddes is remembered as being funny, pleasant and having the “biggest smile.” She was also a correctional officer at the Toronto South Detention Centre. A GoFundMe for her has already achieved upwards of $32,000 in the last week, a feat that Cousins says she is grateful for.
“All the donations are just amazing, and the love and the support. Especially when it’s just me and her as a couple, we think we’re alone, and to have, like the whole world, just hold us… I’ve been so grateful,” she said.
LACK OF FOOD ALLERGY TRAINING
Joey Salmingo, the founder and program director of the FATE Initiative (which stands for Food Allergy Training and Education), says Brown-Geddes’s story is all too common. Salmingo, who lost his sister in a devastatingly similar way, emphasizes that the lack of allergen mandates in the food service industry will cause further incidents like this to occur.
“The unfortunate thing is, these stories are way too familiar,” Salmingo says.
“In Ontario… there isn’t a law or a policy in the food service world where it says that your staff must be educated about food allergies, and it sounds so contradicting, because you are in this food service industry… Realistically, it’s really easy to say, well, this doesn’t affect me. I don’t have food allergies, so I don’t need to pay attention, but the second you start to live with that mentality, especially in working in the food service sector, you’re going to let your guard down, and someone’s going to get hurt.”
In Canada, common allergens and gluten sources must always be clearly declared on food labels when present as ingredients or components of ingredients, according to Health Canada. The allergens will appear in the ingredient list or in a “Contains” statement located immediately after the ingredient list. However, there are no laws in place that dictate anything about allergens being named in or near to the title.
In Salmingo’s situation, his sister who had a nut allergy consumed mochi from Whole Foods, which contained cashew milk that was not clearly labeled. After visiting the location, he was able to take steps towards getting in touch with the company’s global food safety leader who wanted to rectify the unfortunate situation. Within months, Whole Foods across North America began to change the labels on their displays to show which foods contain nuts.
“It’s been six years, and I still really haven’t processed losing my sister Joanna the way that we did, because she died eating her favourite dessert, something that she had eaten time and time again,” he said.
“But my way of coping with that loss is having her legacy continue on by educating people on how serious these could be.”
HOW SEVERE ALLERGIC REACTIONS CAN BE PREVENTABLE
Editor and Content Chief of allergicliving.com Gwen Smith says that food labelling is a “two-way street” between companies and consumers, and urges people with allergies to do their due diligence when consuming foods.
“As a person with food allergies, I always make sure I ask. I actually carry a little card that has my food allergies on it. It gets complex. We’re seeing too many mistakes with app ordering, and you know that that’s a big problem. But with the restaurant themselves, they really need more food allergy training,” Smith said
“This is pretty common now that people have these severe food allergies and their people have to know, we need really precise labelling. We need to be transparent, particularly about the top allergens that you’re seeing, and that’s vital, and that’s still not happening.”
Smith says she’s particularly seeing a rise in cases in people within their 20’s and 30’s. Brown-Geddes was 29, while Salmingo’s sister was 30. Smith also cites the case of Dominique Brown, a popular Disney influencer who died from a severe allergic reaction at a brand event in December 2024 after she was assured that the food she was eating would be nut-free. Smith emphasizes that the effects of an allergic reaction can onset very quickly, and encourages people with allergies to walk with an EpiPen to avoid close calls.
“[Deaths] are mostly preventable, and this is the big tragedy here. So, people have to have epinephrine with them,” Smith said.
“We need epinephrine available, because the big problem when somebody has a severe food allergy reaction is that it can start to snowball, and the symptoms get worse and worse. And if it starts getting into the respiratory tract, particularly in somebody with asthma, it can start to affect the cardiovascular system. And I’ve unfortunately covered cases where the person was either in a coma or dead within 15 to 40 minutes.”
When in doubt, Smith says it’s better not to take the chance.
“If you have a food allergy, please make sure you communicate with a restaurant or fast food place about your allergies, and if they say, ‘Oh, we’re not really sure,’ just don’t take the chance and carry your epinephrine.”
