<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>> At Fri, 25 Jun 1999 10:34:38 -0700 Vance wrote: >It should also be mentioned that many who have investigated the oat >controversy insist that there are no commercially grown oats in the US that >are not cross contaminated with gluten. I think Don Wiss also insists on >this. The way I found out I was celiac was from the harsh and steady >reactions I was having from oatmeal fortified with oatbran every morning. I am always amused by the argument that one grain or another is more likely to be contaminated than another, as I believe the real source of danger for contamination is found at mills and processing plants, and is more or less spread out equally for most grains. Oats are often cited as having a higher chance of contamination than other grains because it is a rotational crop with wheat or barley, and kernels of gluten-containing grain occasionally get mixed in. I do not understand why the same people who make the claim that oats are therefore not safe for celiacs do no also include soy in this category, as it is one of the crops that is most commonly rotated with wheat. In any case, from the knowledge that I have gathered over the years about farming and processing grains, I must say that with most grains there is little likelihood of contamination due to the mixing of two different whole grains (i.e., the rotational crop hypothesis). This is due to the different sizes and shapes of different grains, and the machines which sort them after a harvest. If any grains do get mixed the amount would be extremely low. At this URL: http://www.celiac.com/oats.html#pizzey you can find a letter to me from a Trevor Pizzey, Vice President of Operations for Can-Oat Milling, which is a large farming operation in Canada. Mr. Pizzey believes that celiacs should avoid oats because they find between 2.1 and 4.1 kernels of barley or wheat in every 4,000 (0.0525% and 0.1025% respectively). He says that this level can legally go up to a maximum level of 10 kernels per 4,000 (0.25%). In either of these scenarios we are talking about very low amounts, and the likelihood that one would eat 1 or 2 kernels of wheat or barley on a given day would also be very low. Also, since most people eat whole oatmeal the can take very simple additional precautions to make their chances of eating any kernels of wheat or barley practically zero. The obvious way to do this is to look at the oats before you eat them or mill them and pull out any kernels that are of non-oat type. Now we turn to the other part of the argument to scare people away from grains that, taken by themselves, do not cause harm to people with celiac disease. This is the "wheat dust in the mill (or during transport, or somewhere else) argument." There are many reasons, both health and safety, why mills take steps to keep dust levels down. Dust contamination is still possible, but I think we are also talking about even lower amounts that we were with the occasional kernel of wheat that pops up in oats, although there is no data that I know of to back this up. I think with whole oats (i.e., oatmeal) people can reduce any possible risk of wheat-dust contamination to almost zero by rinsing off their oats well with water before cooking them. The famous oat study that was done in Finland and published in the NEJM used a source of non-contaminated oats to eliminate any possible factors that could ruin the results of the long and expensive work. It is possible that they could have used Quaker oats for their study and gotten the same results. Again, the reasons for not doing so were to eliminate any possible factors that might affect the results of their study. Last, there is a danger of contamination which comes from unclean equipment at mills, and at processing plants. This danger is present with any gluten-free grain, bean, etc., that is milled using the same equipment as is used to mill a gluten-containing grain. In other words we cannot speak of only oats with regard to this issue, as rice flour, soy flour, etc., could be contaminated equally in this way. Aside from legislation to require cleaning between milling runs, those who are worried about this need to buy flours from mills which they have researched and found to be gluten-free, or ones that adequately clean their equipment between runs. I think contamination issues are real, but need to be put in perspective with regard to other, perhaps more important issues, like labeling laws and getting agreement between the major celiac organizations in this country with regard to which grains are safe. Scott Adams - San Francisco, USA Celiac Support Page: http://www.celiac.com/ The Gluten-Free Mall(TM) Your Special Diet Superstore!(TM) http://www.glutenfreemall.com/