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From original post:
><< I realize that any generalizations are sometimes dangerous, but why don't
> we just accept the fact that there are no fast food chains that can provide
> gluten free meals with any guarantee of no contamination, etc, etc...>>
 
Reply:
>I find posts like this particularly UNHELPFUL...
 
On the contrary, I find posts like the original one *VERY* helpful.
While some of us with lower levels on sensitivity and a limited range of
sensitivities **may*1** be able to get away with eating fast food etc. for
many of the rest of us the risks are simply too great.
 
The constant risk of people with special needs like ours is getting tire of
all the inconviences and gradually letting down our guard so that our
health deteriorates so gradually that we don't notice it.   (The "boiled
frog"   phenomenon:   If you put a frog in a pan of hot water, he will jump
out.  If you put him in a pan of cold water and *gradually* heat it, you
can boil him before he jumps.   It's not *that* bad with people but it is
possibly to get pretty sick without noticing if it happens gradually enough
(untill you stop what was making you get sick and get well - *then* the
change is obvious.)
 
*****We need constant reminders of the risks and problems we face and I
find that such posts are most helpful indeed****.
 
The basic question is "who/what gets the benefit of the doubt"?   The fast
food or **US**?    I say, give **yourself**  (and your health!) the benefit
of the doubt.
 
Jim Barron
Chapel Hill NC
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_________________
*1   whether or not any of us really "gets away" with eating fast food is
an open question considering that 1)  you can sustain a level of damage to
the gut without showing observable symptoms that is still probably
detrimental to your health by causing subclinical malabsorption and/or
increasing the probability of certain cancers.
2)  the tremdous variation between different branches of the same fast food
chain,  differences between the same branch depending on whose in charge at
that time, changes in policies, changes in products, substitutions, new
personel who don't follow proceedures (on one the highest turnovers of
personell in any business)
3) the frequent switching of special orders (more than once I observed my
baked potatoe *without margarine* being switched with someone else's - one
on the many reasons I gave up on fast food **and enjoyed much better health
as a result**)