On the link, i noticed someone (don;t remember who) said they heard of someone choking on a bay leaf and dying.
A little perspective - i think there is probably not a single thing we eat that hasn;t killed someone. You can die of a chicken bone, but we don;t remove the bones from the roast chicken; you can die of any smallish piece of food that you swallow whole and goes the wrong way, but we don;t puree all the food we serve to avoid that. So, yes, you could also choke to death on a bay leaf.
But bay leaf is not pleasant to get in your teeth and on your tongue when it's in small pieces with their sharp edges, which is reason enough to either remove them or blend them really to dust. And the damage to the digestive track, i guess that is another consideration, not true of other foods (unless your guests like to chew and swallow their chicken bones!)
As for the egg shell damaging the intestine (from the linked thread) - I imagine the acid in the stomach would dissolve an egg shell alm,ost instantly (since even vinegar will dissolve egg shells, and stomach acid is much stronger, something not true of bay leaves), At least it would soften the edges - so unless we're talking about damage to the esophagus, i tend to think that the story about them perforating the intestine is unreliable - but then i have no hard data on that.
