Swedish gender equality minister admits seeking help for ‘world’s weirdest phobia’ of BANANAS with staff having to remove them from rooms before she enters
Sweden’s gender equality minister has admitted she needs help to tackle her banana phobia, as she needs tools to sweep rooms to remove the fruit before she can enter.
Paulina Brandberg said she is currently seeking medical treatment for what she has described as “the world’s weirdest phobia” after emails revealing her staff’s “banana proofing” actions were leaked to Expressen.
Emails allegedly sent before she made official visits requested that there be “no traces of bananas” in the room she was said to be in, claiming Brandberg had a “strong allergy” to the fruit.
In another email, her staff said there should be no bananas in the areas she entered during an event she was attending. The host’s response was, “We will secure the conference so there are no bananas.”
A third email from Brandberg’s team to the district council stated that “no bananas are allowed on the property.”
Paulina Brandberg said she is currently seeking medical treatment for her banana phobia
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said on Thursday that Brandberg’s problem had not affected government work. Pictured: Brandberg and a guest attend the Swedish National Day celebrations in Stockholm on June 6, 2024
A banana phobia can be triggered by seeing or smelling the yellow fruit, and can cause anxiety and nausea
The gender equality minister himself admitted to having a banana phobia in several social media posts in 2020, which appear to have been deleted after the news broke this week.
“I have a phobia of bananas,” Brandberg wrote in a post on September 11, 2020, while in another post on August 6, 2020, she said it is “the craziest phobia in the world.” reports Politics.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said on Thursday that Brandberg’s problem had not affected government work.
“I have full respect for people with different phobias,” he said.
‘I am disturbed when a hard-working minister is almost reduced to a phobia and people make fun of it. I think you should be too good for that.”
Brandberg’s fellow politicians also rushed to her defense after demands for banana-free zones made global headlines.
Education Minister Johan Pehrson, a fellow Liberal, said the media attention following the revelations was “absurd.”
“She is a staunch liberal and former prosecutor. Often in cases where she was on the side of vulnerable women. That’s what we should all be able to focus on,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
Teresa Carvalho, an MP from the opposition Swedish Social Democratic Party and its spokesperson for legal policy, said she also suffered from bananaphobia.
“We may have had many hard debates about working life conditions, but at this point we stand united against a common enemy,” she told Brandberg on X.
A banana phobia can be triggered by seeing or smelling the yellow fruit, and can cause anxiety and nausea.
There are several phobias and food allergies that are not officially classified.
The gender equality minister herself admitted to having a banana phobia in several social media posts in 2020
Emails reportedly sent before she made official visits requested that there be “no traces of bananas” in the room she was said to be in. Pictured: Brandberg attends a ceremony marking the opening of the autumn session of the Swedish Parliament on September 10, 2024 in Stockholm
Banana phobia is a rare condition and is not officially classified, but the International Classification of Diseases places the fear of food in a group of specific, isolated phobias.
It comes after a woman revealed she had such an extreme phobia of bananas that she couldn’t eat one for 20 years.
Paula Ross’s anxiety became so bad that she couldn’t bear to be in the same room as the fruit and felt sick whenever she smelled one.
She was tormented at school when bullies chased her around the playground waving bananas, but only overcame her fear after a hypnotherapy program.
And another woman revealed she couldn’t walk through the fruit aisle in any supermarket because of her fear of the fruit.
If Fran Dando were to catch even a glimpse of a banana, the child worker would hyperventilate, sweat profusely and even vomit.
Fran said in 2010: ‘It started when I was seven and my brother James put a banana in my bed as a joke.
‘I got into bed and as I lay down I felt this horrible slimy thing under my body. I had no idea what it was, but it terrified me.
“Since then, whenever I see one, the same feeling comes over me again.”