A Swedish government minister’s fear of bananas has become a national talking point after emails revealed that such is the strength of her aversion that aides try to clear rooms of the fruit before she enters.
Paulina Brandberg, the minister for gender equality and work life, has previously spoken out about her issue with bananas, describing it as “the world’s weirdest phobia”.
Leaked emails this week showed that her staff have gone to great measures to ensure she does not come into contact with the fruit.
The correspondence, published by the newspaper Expressen, includes an email to the Swedish speaker’s office in September stipulating that “no traces of bananas must be in the room” before she attended a meeting with a colleague, owing to a “strong allergy”.
According to other emails, her staff said there must not be any bananas in any of the spaces she entered at an event she was attending. “We will secure the conference so that there are no bananas,” read the response.
Sweden’s prime minster, Ulf Kristersson, said on Thursday that Brandberg’s problem had not affected government work.
“I have all the respect for people who have different phobias,” he said. “I am disturbed when a hard-working cabinet minister is almost reduced to a phobia and people make fun of it. I think you should be too good for that.”
Brandberg declined to comment to the Guardian but she told Expressen that it was an issue she was “getting professional help with”.
The education minister, Johan Pehrson, a fellow Liberal, said the media attention in response to the revelations was “absurd”. “She is a staunch liberal and former prosecutor. Often in cases where she stood on the side of vulnerable women. We should all be able to focus on that instead,” he wrote on X.
Members of the opposition have also spoken in Brandberg’s support. Teresa Carvalho, the Social Democrats’ legal policy spokesperson, said she had the same phobia. “We have had many tough debates about working conditions, but on this issue we stand united against a common enemy,” she wrote.
