Senior health service officials are examining ways to make potentially life-saving adrenaline shot epi-pens more widely available after the tragic death of a 14-year-old girl from a nut allergy last Christmas.

Children with potentially fatal food allergies are forced to wait up to three years to be tested because hospital screening services cannot cope with demand.

Research into allergies which concludes that a tolerance to peanuts can be built up slowly has been welcomed by the country’s only expert in allergies among children.

AS the mother of a teenager who has the allergy reaction, anaphylaxis, I was shocked by the tragic story of Emma Sloan, who died on the street in Dublin after a Christmas meal with her family.

The pharmacy regulator has started an inquiry into a Dublin chemist that refused to give an emergency adrenaline pen to a mother whose 14-year-old daughter died minutes later on the street because of a nut allergy.