In fact, you are mistaken in that the body stores toxins in fat cells - are you arguing that these are good things to have in your body? One can construct a diet of whole foods (read as unprocessed, non-GMO) that is naturally detoxifying.

GMOs have nothing to do with toxins...that is just a scam being used by the organic food sellers. Selling the same product for a lot more money.

organic farming is about a whole lot more than toxins in food! it's even more about lessening the chemical load in our soil, and rebuilding the soil with actual organic matter instead of merely adding a few chemically-based minerals that have no chance of keeping our soils effective in the long term.

educate yourself!

I completely agree. Organic farming is about a whole lot more than a trend. Toxins are so prevalent in our everyday lives and it is important for cell regeneration that we eat healthfully. Ingesting greens and antioxidants are paramount. Physical activity is important as well. I do find it funny when people are on a Gfree diet because it's the thing to do. However, I appreciate anyone whom chooses to improve their well-being. If it makes them feel better, than why not! To each their own. I was diagnosed as Celiac over 8 years ago. I am thankful that products are easier to find...although many are way overpriced and taste terrible. I guess like any wave, these products will be discontinued and the best will stay.

you have to see this hilarious food video I found on Youtube.. just go to Youtube and search for "whipped and beaten culinary" and you will find it. it made me crack the heck up.. you gotta check it out!

You have to check out this hilarious food video that is on Youtube.. just go to youtube and search for "whipped and beaten culinary works" to find it.. but if you get offended easily though.. don't go...

I put this whole gluten free deal in the same category as the push against high fructose corn syrup. For healthy people, there is nothing wrong with eating either of these. The key is moderation, like everything else. If you eat too much of either of these there will be health consequences. There are without a doubt people who, do to an underlying disease or condition, will benefit from removing gluten or high fructose corn syrup from their diets. However, for the average person with no health conditions, neither of these is a problem in moderation.

not even,

I hope your "Two words describing any diet that equal fraud" comment was not intended to imply that the gluten free diet is a fraud. I suffered with a multitude of health problems before I was finally diagnosed with Celiac D

That's 3 words unless you also count the "and", in which case its 4 words.

Pith is 100% correct, in addition, GMO will reduce the amount of pesticide, herbicide, and fertilizers you consume while increasing the global food supply. Win-win if the general public would educate itself.

Now on to gluten-free and other popular diets...most people will not benefit from these diets, and some will even see negative impact because of these fad diets. Just because someone with Celiac's needs this diet does NOT mean everybody does. Just because some celebrity chooses this diet because it's popular now, does NOT mean it's good for everyone. Most of these stars never graduated high school, they are not who we should look to for health advice. In my opinion, any celeb who endorses a fad diet is worse than all the DTC advertising coming from the health care industry combined.

My mother, after years of doctor visits and thyroid problems, was finally diagnosed with Celiac disease about a year ago.

This certainly is not a "trendy fade" as one of the ignorant people cited above. You are extremely limited with what you can eat. It makes the Atkins Diet look like a walk in the park. Thankfully for here, her symptoms subsided and her thyroid is almost back to normal.

The human body wasn't meant to digest gluten....cavemen didnt subsist and evolve on "Whole grains" and spaghetti. So it's no surprise that the medical community is starting to realize that an increasing number of people have varying degrees of sensitivity to wheat products.

It's like feeding your dog a pizza and bagel everyday and wondering why they are lethargic and fat. Contrary to the USDA"s food pyramid people, we don't need "5-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice and pasta" a day!

Hi Pippo Schillaci,

I also suffer from ulcerative colitis and I have been on a gluten-free diet for almost a year now. I have seen a major change in my health since then, I have limited flare-ups (and that is only when I eat things which cause it). I am so glad I found out about the gluten-free diet.

I complain enough about MSNBC ---but this was actually a well researched topic. Good job MSNBC. My husband has an extreme sensitivity to Gluten so I do a lot of whole food cooking lots of veggies, fruits and lean chicken and fish ( which people should eat anyway)

I know there is no scientific research to back up my claim but when I minimized my toddler sons gluten intake his behavior improved dramatically. Maybe there was something else to it like food coloring or whatever but the low gluten intake worked and it was dramatic!

HOWEVER, Absolutely DO NOT put your child on a gluten free diet without a doctors permission---it can be dangerous. I am a medical researcher so I had all his vitamins and minerals balanced with lots of good carbs like potatoes and bananas and then had my pediatrician ok it.

BTW: I talk to many people with gluten intolerance and they all think that Oats have gluten.....they don't! They are usually processed with grains that do have gluten so they get contaminated. There are now many oat options that are processed on "clean' machines. You can eat oatmeal cookies and oats and oatbread....it really helps a lot when you want that thick carby taste.

That sounds tough! It's such a relief, when suffering finally ends.

'Older and Wiser' -- Seems to me it's only "trendy" if normal, healthy people go nuts over this and other fad diets. The good side to all this is, that there are a lot more gluten-free products on the market now, and I'm glad people like you have the benefit of that.

Older and wiser, My Mom also was recently diagnosed but only after finding a doctor who did not regard advanced age as a synonym for disposable. A gluten-free diet changed her life as well. I am glad that medical science is finally catching these phantom diseases instead of disregarding them.

Hope you continue to find relief and good health.

Barbara in Houston: I want the name of your mother's doctor! I am so frustrated with my mother's doctor! She is 71, with emphysema and Stage 4 Lung Cancer. I had not even considered that the symptoms she's had all her life could be the result of this disease. I see more research in my near future.

It took physicians so long to "discover" Fibromyalgia, which is a real ailment and one that I have. Hmmmmmmmmm, perhaps if we all just ate a little healthier, everything in moderation, we'd all be better off. However, the remark about being "trendy", I believe was misinterpreted. It is my opinion that perhaps the writer was referring to all of the "crap" being sold that is supposed to help you lose weight, tone up, etc. Ummmm, my idiot sister thought that a "colonic cleansing" would be good for my seriously ill mother, who only weighed 88 lbs. at the time. She almost killed her and she spent 2 weeks in the hospital as a result. "Trendy" crap can cause serious injury.

My Mother too HAD stage 4 cancer- ovarian - as well as celiac disease (I too have celiac - we also both have fibromyalgia). The cancer has disappeared after being treated by Dr. Nagourney in Long Beach, CA.

Kaiser gave her the # to hospice - I

I experienced 15 years of daily diarrhea also before my daughter told me about a friend with gluten intolerance. I have been symptom-free for two years.

I have reintroduced an occasional gluten product with success.

I experienced 15 years of daily diarrhea also before my daughter told me about a friend with gluten intolerance. I have been symptom-free for two years.

I have reintroduced an occasional gluten product with success.

Dismayed, Sorry for the latent reply(I have not been checking my feed). My Mom lives in Wisconsin so I am not sure that her doctor would be able to treat your Mom.

However, I have started a process with myself as well as my Mother of interviewing Doctors BEFORE we hire them. Texas has 2 great Medical Centers: one in and around Houston, and one in San Antonio.

A Doctor(who shall remain nameless, but has a prominent radio show in Houston) treated me for COPD and "wrote off" the rest of my symptoms as my imagination. Hell, he did not even listen to me when I came in for a check-up. So after a particular incident, I fired him and sought out a new physician.

Find recommendations from Knowledgeable acquaintances for your choice in Physicians and interview the hell out of them. A few warning signs are: 1) If they do not request your Medical Records from your previous Physicians; 2) If they do not really LISTEN to what you KNOW about your own body; 3) The first 'consult' MUST be in the Office of the Doctor(you know, where his/her desk is) not a treatment room; 4) (and this I find most offensive so I am very overt in asking) If you are interviewing on behalf of an elderly person, find out what their attitude is toward the elderly. At the first hint of "well that happens when you get older" RUN like hell.

Good hunting to you and your Mom.

BTW, after I found a new doctor, not the Radio quack, and after he Listened to all of my symptoms, he sent me for an MRI where they found an advanced brain tumor. I was referred to and treated by MD Anderson, where several brilliant and dedicated Doctors saved my life.

It is the Quacks that can kill you, as much as the disease.

I don't think that it is just MSNBC and "progressive" (whatever that means) sites. It seems to me that if you are a news organization of any type then you are probably incapable of accurately reporting science news.

The problem is they also lumped intolerance in with an autoimmune condition, as there is a big difference between the two. On top of that, they did not look at any mitigating factors, like weight and health. Intolerance can just be a cop-out of eating way too much of something relatively unhealthy.

This article is far from perfect, especially in that the medical field has known that gluten is a major allergan/sensitivity factor (which IS immune mediated, even though not AUTOimmune) for decades. There is a large genetic component to being glluten sensitive, and one can diagnose such via a combination of blood test as well as gluten abstinence and then ingestion. But Mike Hu, 1 out of 2 Americans is NOT lactose intolerant! Globally, yes, but this article is written for the 99% who are reading it in the US. Also, registered dieticians work their butts off to get that credential. WTF r u?

I don't know about you, but I'm a teacher. I majored in Science. I won't deny that dietitians work hard to get their credentials. You are rude. People only know what they have read in articles (even those published in medical journals) or learned first hand. There is absolutely no reason to be (or as it appears in print) rude.

I apologize. I should have made sure that I referred to the person making the offensive remark. And that would be the one who calls him/herself : Dr. Gabriel.

Mike Hu is on the right track with dairy products. Milk is designed to turn a 70 pound calf into a 700 pound cow or 1000 pound bull in 2-3 years. It is not designed for human consumption. Check out "The China Study" by Dr. T. Colin Campbell.

There are reasons why arabs and europeans have lactose enzymes. That is to help digest milk. The arguement that it is not meant for human consumption is just amusing. What else would you use those enzymes for?

If that were the case, vegetables are not meant for human consumption as we do not have the enzymes or microorganisms to utilize the fiber.

DrGabrial,

Celiac is an autoimmune condition, so I hope you were not refering to that when you made your statement.

Gluton intollerance on the other hand, it probably more environmental than genetic.

It is a pain---you really have to plan all your meal on Sunday. After eating whole foods and snacking on fruits and veggies you lose the taste for fast food etc.....it all just smells and tastes fake

yes but other than bread products the cost difference is nearly irrelevant. invest in yourself! who cares if you spend a few dollars more on your diet? buy fewer luxuries...

Kim, you could not have said it better! Hope everyone reads your comment.

DrGabriel's comment was insensitive (gee is there a theme here with him/her?) with regard to spending a fewdollars more on food and buying fewer "luxuries". Frankly, prepared GF foods are a luxury. GF pasta is 2 or 3 x the price of regular pastas. Having to make cream soups from scratch or buy Pacific brand (which is crazy expensive compared to Campbells) makes having something as simple as tuna casserole an expensive proposition. As both of us were diagnosed with Celiac, do we take chances with our children's lives by not making this a GF household? (Moot point as our oldest is gluten sensitive.) DrGabriel you are a clod and I hope to God your "dr" status is not medical because your insensitivity is a shame to the medical profession (as a nurse, I'm glad I don't have to work with you).

Amen, GFbutnotbychoice! My 5-year old daughter and I were both diagnosed with Celiac in February. Between diagnostic testing (we are seeing a functional medicine practioner - out of network so big time $$ but he LISTENS whereas neither of our doctors did), and the cost of GF food...it's crazy! We had genetic testing done which showed any children I have will have it and any children my daughter has will have it. In addition, we are both immunologically intollerant to dairy and allergic to eggs and peantus. Eating otu isn't even fun anymore so we don't do it often. Even sticking to staples of lean meats, fruits, veggies, will increase the grocery bill exponentially. My daughter needs to have shelf-stable snacks for school. Thank goodness there are some out there now - even though I need to pay $5/each vs. on sale for $1 - $2.

I was recently diagnosed with Celiac disease in January and I don't think a gluten free diet is that much more expensive unless you buy a lot of the substitute foods like GF pasta and bread (which I now make myself). However eating too much of those substitute foods isn't good either because you can end up with other issues such as diabetes (rice for example has a very high glycemic index, and a lot of gluten free baking mixes and pastas are made from rice flour). When I go grocery shopping I have a budget of $50 and I manage to get a lot of food that lasts around 2+ weeks depending on what it is, i.e. frozen veggies, rice, potatoes, and meat. I would actually spend more than that before I was diagnosed because I would buy tons of frozen TV dinners and other processed food (Stouffer's is not cheap!!). I now take the time to cook and bake my own meals, which I find to actually be relaxing sometimes rather than a nuisance like I did before I was diagnosed.

Don't you wonder if the sensitivities to certain parts of our diet can be, at least in part, attributed to the overabundance of things like gluten in our diets. Food processors use things in foods we never think are there (gluten popping up in so many foods for example).

You are right Brett, eat the fruit, veggie, or meat in its simplest form, or cook up the exceptional at home with ingredients you recognize. It's cheaper, healthier, and almost always tastier!

foods are rarely good nor bad! theyre on a spectrum of healthfulness, and bread has been part of the human diet for thousands of years. of course it's not BAD! some people are just immune-sensitive to gluten. but few are sensitive to rice; quinoa; amaranth; etc. that grain is bad is totally a fad! think for yourself...

DrGabriel, I have read a series of your comments, and you are one arrogant SOB.

um, you mixed up your anti-food arguments. wheat has been an integral part of the human diet for at least 20,000 years. dairy products, on the other hand, have been consumed by humans for less than 5,000. that is why almost everyone has some level of lactose intolerance, yet less than 1 in 100 have issues with gluten.

for the vast majority of people, gluten is perfectly fine for their body. bad? only if you have a medical reason (or are an ignorant alarmist). but like everything else, moderation and balance is the key, not being a food nazi.

Simply untrue!!! Wheat originated from a family of grasses known as Triticeae. This family of grasses has co-evolved with humans from our origins in sub-saharan Africa.

As a matter of fact recent studies indicate that the proteins in wheat that cause a sensitivity to wheat in humans likely evolved "for protection against dedicated or continuous consumption by mammalian seed eaters"

That kind of evolution only happens over a massive timescale.

Rye is not gluten-free. Neither is barley. Even grains without gluten are contaminated if they are milled & processed in a facility which also processes wheat, rye, barley, etc.

I have non-celiac gluten intolerance and people with that or celiac cannot have rye. It has gluten in it.

I have to read every label and make sure that I can eat the food. Even though I don't have full blown celiac, if I have a little gluten and not know it or my food is cross contaminated, I feel sick as a dog. It sucks for me and for my husband who is not gluten free but unfortunately, we have found it's a way of life. Cry a river, build a bridge, and then get over it.

I could not agree more!! My son has celiac disease and it is a major pain - expensive, difficult to plan meals and almost impossible to eat out. While we all eat healthier since his diagnosis, I cannot imagine anyone ever choosing this diet if it were not required. On the plus side, he has gained 8 pounds and grown 2 inches in about 3 months, so for him it is working.

Wasn't this article about gluten?

I have to agree with your statements here. Maybe back to the simple basics would be a great experiment, with volunteers, to prove this point. One has to wonder why it hasn't been done before? And if it has, forgive my ignorance, just tell me where to find the study results.

J Stanton, Oh, if it were only that simple. I agree with eliminating processed foods and more fruits and vegetables, but more, especially red, meat can cause other problems.

People with Celiac, or even just a sensitivity need advice from a competent Doctor, clinician, or 'other holistic' provider. While your comments have some merit, and I am sure you mean well, YOU are not that person.

The LAST thing a person with a Phantom Disease needs is a "one size-fits-all-Dr-Oz-type" telling them the end-all-be-all-this-will-cure-all-your-ills solution.

No offence meant.

flylow, I did the same thing and I am happy to say that my joint pain is relatively non-existent, as well.. I know that some people don't believe in it, try to discourage it's use or say it's fake but I also use injections of hCG. They may not work fr everyone but they work for me!

OK David...

Thanks for the cheery look at the future....

Just remember the scene from Blazing Saddles.....

Bart: A man drink like that and he don't eat, he is going to DIE.

Jim: When?

;-))

it's generally believed to be the unprecedented chemical load that humans have produced for ourselves and all other life forms to absorb over the last several decades. it's a concept called 'total load', meaning the greater amount of allergans/irritants in one's environment, the greater likelihood one will react to any one of these allergans/irritants.

this is hardly undiagnosed. we post-modern humans are just so used to chemicals in our environment that we somehow think it's normal. for 99.9999% of our existence, it hasnt been NORMAL...

I hadn't realized anyone had taken my somewhat rhetorical question seriously. I would have thought there were lots of chemicals around when I was a kid: drinking from the garden hose, the chemicals used to manufacture carpeting, agricultural pesticides, lead-based paint, parents who smoked, the advent of the TV dinner, Twinkies, and so on, but apparently there must be much more today.

I just read some articles relating the lack of parasitic infections in developed countries correlating to the increase in autoimmune diseases. It's apparently a controversial theory but one that is being researched. Basically, parasitic infections in childhood help tune our immune systems. Without this training, our immune systems get out of whack and turn on us. Non-developed countries have almost no diseases like IBS (Irritable Bowel Disease), Type-1 Diabetes, and others. There is some evidence that introducing non-lethal parasites decreases symptoms of IBS. It's all unproven as yet, but very interesting.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=helminthic-therapy-mucus

Speak for yourself...

One of my earliest memories is stealing a slice of bread from the kitchen table. Celiac has been a part of my life, all my life.

Just because YOU did not know about it, or because it did not receive the attention the internet now offers, does not mean it did not exist, or that others did not fashion their lives around it.

Following trends is never wise and I am gratified that medical science is validating disorders and sensitivities that were disregarded before.

Cheers

Let's be clear about this. Celiac sufferers, of whom I am one, are not "allergic" to gluten; and because it is genetic, can manifest in young children or people with the condition can live for many years without being clearly symptomatic. In part, and this is according to my gastroenterologist, the increasing numbers of celiac and gluten intolerant patients is simply because the medical profession is getting better daily at diagnosing it.

I was just diagnosed 4 weeks ago with celiac sprue. I have suffered with a variety of ailments since childhood that no one could ever explain - including stomach disorders, anemia, infertility, osteoporosis, chronic sinusitis - just to name a few. Last year I battled breast cancer - I'll never know if my lifetime of being undiagnosed played a role in the cancer. I finally feel like there is a chance for me to get better. I have replaced my "bread" with gluten-free corn tortillas which can be paired with lots of things and relatively inexpensive. We are just now hearing more about this, because in the past, American doctors did not test for celiac. In fact, about 12 years ago, I was allergy tested and wheat did not cause a histamine (allergic) reaction when given twice. Bittersweet, but upwards and onwards! No looking back only forward for me.

CallMeCynical- Amen! I am so tired of hearing about Gluten Allergy. An allergic reaction is not what celiac disease is. The only allergy involving "gluten" is a wheat allergy. It can cause anaphylactic shock same as peanuts or shellfish. While debilitating, celiac is not a threat of rapid, choking death.

I hope that no one that you love will ever be diagnosed with celiac disease, however if they were, you might not be so ill-informed and rude with disregard of those who do suffer from this disease.

Sir, if I were you, I'd go back to school and get an education. Celiac disease is very real and very dangerous. I suffer from it and its not pleasant. If I were to eat anything with even a hint of gluten in it, I would suffer from intestine inflammation. It feels like being stabbed there.

That was about the most ignorant statement yet.

Good LORD

It is true!

If you leave a Monkey in a room with a keyboard it WILL eventually type readable sentences.

So Celiac is a concoction of industry? Are you MAD?

I agree with Kunaskev "get an education"

Better yet, how about spending a few hours in a windowless, locked room with me after I eat pasta or god forbid drink a beer....