

Are You Really Gluten-Intolerant? Maybe Not - growlix
http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2014/05/are_you_really_gluten-sensitive.html

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tzs
Regardless of whether or not gluten-intolerance is as widespread as some claim
it is, I'd like to see a simple change to food labeling to make it easier for
those who want to know what they are eating to find out: versioning on labels.

The way it works now, I go to the supermarket. I see, say, a frozen spaghetti
and meatball entree. I carefully read the long label to see if it has anything
that makes me want to avoid it [1]. It passes. I buy it. I like it. Can I now
just buy it again, without reading the label?

Nope! Food companies like to tinker with their products to improve consumer
satisfaction and to cut their costs and increase their profits, so I need to
read the label again.

If they put version information, such as a last change date, on the ingredient
list I could then just glance at the date and see if it has changed since I
last bought the item.

This should be doable at almost zero cost to the food producers if it is
phased in by making the switch to versioning on a given product the next time
they are changing the label.

[1] I have no known foods that I must avoid for medical reasons, but I have
some admittedly irrational requirements. Some time when I was a kid, I decided
for some reason to stop eating meats other than beef and pork. I have
sometimes described myself as a lacto-ovo-bovo-porco vegetarian.

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rdtsc
> The ingestion of gluten, a protein found in grains like wheat, rye, and
> barley, gives rise to antibodies that attack the small intestine.

Is this something new? Growing up in a different country I don't remember
_ever_ hearing about this. And here is a huge "Gluten free X" market, where X
is just about everything.

Does this sound odd or strange? Isn't gluten something people have been eating
for a very long time now? And now we've evolved this strange sensitivity to
it. So the idea is that it is these FODMAPs. Do we today end up eating more
products with FODMAPs while before when baking bread it just didn't have that
many of those?

I feel the same is happening with allergies. I don't remember hearing much
about allergies. I only knew one kid in my high-school who had asthma. But now
I know a lot of people in this country that are allergic to all kind of
things. Heck my wife is. I have become allergic to pollen in the spring (and
it never bothered me as a kid).

Anyway, it just seems very puzzling.

~~~
d23
I've been having terrible stomach issues for about a year now. I went to a
nutritionist who suggested a FODMAP elimination phase to try to identify the
problem. Nothing seemed to help. I don't really know what to do now.

~~~
rdtsc
I am sorry to hear that. That sounds very frustrating.

Maybe try a different doctor. Maybe keep a diary of what you eat. See if there
is something in particular the make it worse.

We had to do it for our kid to see if they are allergic to certain foods
(since my wife is).

~~~
bane
Sometimes that doesn't work, allergens don't always trigger the same response,
or the same severity of response with each exposure. It's sometimes just
better to cut out a class of foods for a few weeks and see if that solves it.
The reintroduce it to see if the symptoms return. Then cut out another
(overlapping) class of foods and monitor symptoms. Start to narrow down.
Sometimes the classes of food that, when cut out, eliminate the symptoms can
be false positives as it's one particular food in the class, or one ingredient
in the food. My sister-in-law is allergic to peach skins, but can eat peaches
just fine.

It took quite a few years to figure that out.

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chez17
I love the anti-science bias of people against the gluten-free trend. You're
telling me if an article came out that showed a study with a sample size of 37
people found that marijuana was incredibly harmful we would see the same
"Marijuana confirmed to be incredibly harmful!" all over the internet? With
the same certainty and intensity? Give me a break. There is a lot of nonsense
in the gluten-free movement, there is no doubt about it. However I don't
understand the hate it generates out of otherwise skeptical and rational
people.

~~~
zinxq
It is perpetually surprising to me how much other people feel it's their
business what other people choose to eat.

~~~
coldpie
It is frustrating as someone who prepares food for others to have to deal with
bullshit "food intolerances" like the current gluten-free fad. I could prepare
a delicious meal for you, but I guess you've decided you're gluten intolerant
(unless you've been diagnosed with Celiac by a doctor, you're not), so
nevermind. Or the tasteless sorghum beer these types bring to parties.

Food's a social thing. Placing nonsense limitations on what's allowed can
really cramp social settings.

~~~
a_m0d
Receiving an official diagnosis by a doctor for celiac is not always possible.
Although my wife's doctor considered it a possibility that she was celiac, he
did not do anything with that idea until she had tried being gluten free
already for a few months and found that it helped her intense pain.

The test for celiac _requires_ a person to have been eating regular amounts of
gluten for _3 months_ before the test is done. When my wife is in a position
such that a crumb of normal bread in her meal can cause her pain afterwards,
there is no way she can eat gluten for 3 months in order to get a diagnosis by
a doctor. The best she can get now is a statement that she is sensitive to
gluten - but that sensitivity is enough that she can't have food cooked in the
same pan as your food when you don't give any consideration to her.

So don't say this is "bullshit food intolerances" \- just because you don't
have to deal with it does not mean that it is not real.

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bake
While gluten itself may or may not produce any ill effects for non-celiacs
(likely not, it seems), it may regardless be a helpful signal of which foods
to avoid for other reasons. Even if only adhered to leniently, a bias against
gluten has been a great help in reducing the quantity of processed food I
consume, the benefit of which I don’t think anyone currently denies.

~~~
nathanm412
Yes, but you could certainly make an attempt to reduce processed foods instead
of indirectly by avoiding gluten. There is plenty of processed food out there
that doesn't rely on wheat, and the gluten free section of the grocery store
is starting to look more and more processed every day.

~~~
bake
Absolutely -- you're spot on.

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chris_mahan
I went gluten-free 2 years ago and all my symptoms went away, I feel better,
have lots of energy, etc.

I did not take a test, but my (non-alternative) internal medicine doctor told
me to go on the gluten free-diet after I explained (in gory details) my
symptoms.

Is the test really necessary then? Really?

~~~
galvanist
On your gluten free diet, do you eat (in no particular order): apples, pears,
peaches, milk, sugar, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, garlic, avocado,
cauliflower, mushrooms, and soft / fresh cheeses?

Do you have any issues with them? They are identified as high FODMAP foods.

[http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1440-1746.2009....](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1440-1746.2009.06149.x/pdf)

~~~
chris_mahan
I do, and I have no issue with them. I eat lots of apples, sugar, broccoli,
mushroom, and cheese. Daily. I eat goat yogurt (I like the taste better) but I
eat some regular yogurt too. I typically don't drink milk (taste again) and
eat almond and coconut milk instead. (Trader Joe's gets lots of my business)

I eat very few processed food, canned food.

I eat all fruit (except kiwi--i get irritable bumps on my tongue), meats,
cheeses, vegetables, rice, potatoes, dairy products, wine, and non-beer, non
whiskey alcohol. (Also, some Shoju is made from wheat, so I only drink those
from sugar cane, potato, sweet potato, etc).

I eat very little fried foods. (Although I won't pass up french fries on
occasion).

~~~
galvanist
That’s what I kinda suspected. It would be hard for me to imagine someone
mistaking sensitivity to the listed foods with a gluten problem.

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growlix
FWIW, I submitted this article with the title "Gluten intolerance is likely
FODMAP intolerance" because I wanted to avoid the condescending, linkbait
title of the original article.

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allannienhuis
Shameless plug for my iPhone/ios app:
[http://isthatglutenfree.com](http://isthatglutenfree.com)

The marketing website is way out of date, but the app is current, regularly
updated (dedicated staff) and has the largest database of gluten-free brands
and products available. The next release (out as soon as I can get it past the
Apple gatekeepers) adds the ability to easily find NEW brands/products.

If you've chosen to eat gluten-free you know that finding tasty gluten-free
products can be a real challenge. I'm trying to help people that have already
made the decision to eat gluten-free; I'm not trying to 'promote' the diet
itself - any significant diet and health decisions really should be made in
consultation with professionals.

Would love to feel some HN love for my app :)

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spindritf
Carbs just can't catch a break lately. I wonder if we finally pinpointed the
problems with modern western diet or will our kids in a few decades see this
as another fad, same way we start to view low fat recommendations.

~~~
VLM
The modern western diet is the fad, if you look at what it is, how long its
been around, and what our biologically identical ancestors ate for a huge
multiple of time longer than the modern western diet.

~~~
gph
>what our biologically identical ancestors ate for a huge multiple of time
longer than the modern western diet.

Why is there a belief that our ancestors had a singularly common diet? Humans
have lived in all areas of the earth with vastly different diets. Some were
high in fat, some were high in protein, some relied on plants/fruit, others
were more balanced, etc.

Yes we probably on average have a higher carb intake than most humans in the
past. But that doesn't mean there was some standardized diet that all pre-
historic humans ate. They ate whatever was around to survive.

~~~
VLM
Its more of an exclusionary process.

The modern western diet is mostly made of vegetable oils, caffeine containing
leaves and beans, huge amounts of refined sugar, ridiculous quantities of
grains, antibiotic infused meats, fruit juices, milks, fermented products,
huge amounts of corn syrup. Its no great challenge to go to the store for
groceries and come home with nothing not on the list above, yet almost none of
it existed more than a couple centuries ago. I realize this is considered an
incredibly controversial opinion; I assume "most people" strongly believe our
ancestors in 8000 BC mostly ate McDonalds and drank MtDew for every meal.

~~~
zevyoura
Tea, coffee, fruit juices, milk, and fermented products have all been around
for much, much more than "a couple centuries."

