On 4/2/06, Susan Gallant <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Can someone explain what celiac disease is? I've heard of a lot of
> illnesses, but that isn't one of them.
>   I'm also wondering about the corn allergies. We didn't hear of people
> being allergic to anything like that when we were growing up and now it
> seems a lot of certain grains(some consider corn a grain) are causing bad
> reactions in people.


There is a theory (not sure if it is considered proven or not) that people
in a culture have the most allergies to the foods that are most prevalent in
that culture.  Which would explain why so many people (relatively speaking)
are allergic to things like wheat and corn in this country.  I have heard
that rice allergies are more prevalent in Japan, whereas here rice is
considered very unlikely to be allergenic.

I think most of the reason we didn't hear about people being allergic to
things such as wheat and corn 30 years ago was mostly the lack of the
internet and its ease of global information-sharing.  Even though wheat and
corn allergies are among the top 8 in this country, they are still, on a
grand scale, quite rare.  Corn, at least, is used a lot more now than it was
when we were growing up (in corn syrup).  Also I suspect that they are more
often recognized for what they are now than they were years ago.  So, you
might never have known about anyone with a wheat allergy, even if it
occurred exactly as often back then as it does now.  I mean, how many people
that you know in real life (and have not met via an allergy support group or
online) have an allergy to grains?  It seems to me that I still don't hear
about people being allergic to wheat in real life, only on allergy boards
online.  If we didn't have the internet, I might still not know of anyone
with this allergy.

--Robyn