Assessing the Procedures Followed to Avoid the Risk of Food Allergies in the Food and Beverage Sector within Lodging Establishments: The Case of Red Sea Governorate

A food allergy can be explained as an immune system response to a food that the body mistakenly believes is harmful. Once the immune system decides that a particular food is harmful, it creates specific reactions to fight it. The next time the individual eats that food, the immune system releases massive amounts of chemicals, including histamine, in order to protect the body. These chemicals trigger a cascade of allergic symptoms that can affect the respiratory system, gastrointestinal tract, skin, and cardiovascular system and reactions can be deadly (The Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Network, 2010).
Several studies illustrated that many of the hotels suffer of the problem or risks that occurring, including the symptoms of allergies to some of the guests so there are many of the actions taken by hotels to avoid this allergies, hence the importance of this research, which is based on the assessing the procedures followed to avoid the risk of food allergies in the food and beverage sector within lodging establishments of Red Sea Governorate, in order to access the best recommendations and suggestions that could contribute to the control of this type of risk so as to ensure the safety of the guests, as well as to avoid the problems that occur for hotels and the hospitality industry in general. In order to reach these goals has been to take advantage of using the two research tools, first Personal interviews with the number of executive chef and food and beverage managers, secondly designed model of personal observations check list that help to evaluate the procedures that already taken inside the hotel in order to control food allergies risk. Finally, it is worth mentioning that due to many obstacles, including difficult access to all Red Sea Governorate hotels destination in addition to the elements of time and cost therefore, the investigated hotels are limited to some of three, four and five star hotels in Red Sea Governorate destination (Hurghada, Quseir and Marsa Alam).