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Date: | Mon, 3 Apr 1995 07:05:29 EST |
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<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>>
In response to the two gluten-HIV references transmitted by Don Wiss:
The first seems open minded to the connection. The second (the way I read
it) says well... we humored those "special diet people" for a while--now lets
get back to what we like to deal with DRUGS!!! I would make the observation
that 'celiacs' knowing without question what gluten can do to them still
STRUGGLE to maintain their diets gluten free. I would therefore question
whether the AIDS patients alluded to in that article maintained STRICT gluten
free diets amidst the medical circus their lives are already caught up in. I
would conclude from the 'Advera' ads that at least one segment of the community
has made their own minds up about what gluten might be doing to them.
Since I've already opened up this can of worms, let me throw a few more
slimy wrigglers out there. A few years ago I read a blurb on quinoa (maybe in
'Prevention') which pointed out that in some sections of Africa where quinoa
was traditionally grown, the hardiness of the plant made it impervious to the
usual climatic vagaries. It was when the U.N. stepped in and convinced the
locals that they should be growing WHEAT instead that massive crop failures and
resulting famine began to become a serious problem. If this information is
accurate, wouldn't it be ironic that the lightning spread of AIDS in the same
regions was somehow connected to the recent introduction of gluten into
populations not used to it? I'm not implying that gluten causes AIDS, only
that it facilitates the malabsorption problems that eventually can cause death.
But let me be up front about all of this. I'm convinced that celiacs'
needs will never be taken seriously until it can be demonstrated that gluten
has some negative (however tenuous) effect on the general population. We need
Meryl Streep with tears in her eyes on national TV talking about GLUTEN and
what it's doing to our children. Doesn't anyone wonder what the heck WHEAT is
doing in 99% of the products on the supermarket shelves to begin with? I mean
they were even planning on coating fresh fruit with it!!! (whatever happened to
that idea anyway?). It's been thirty years since antismoking groups took on
the tobacco growers and they haven't made a dent in the industry. I shudder at
the thought of what will happen to us if we begin suggesting that maybe there's
a whole bunch of products that wheat shouldn't be in to begin with and just
maybe the wheat industry should stop thinking of new places to unload their
surplus, heavily subsidised product. So that's why a possible gluten-HIV
connection excites me--the thought of tapping into all that political muscle
and prepackaged outrage for free (do you think they would have discontinued
KenMei if an AIDS patient told Connie Chung it was the only cereal he could
eat?).
Oh god... I think I'v written my first flame. Excuse me, this once, but I
do feel much better now.
[log in to unmask]
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