Arsenic in Gluten Free Products

[Michele62]

Here is another question.  Someone posted on my facebook page that rice flour & other products such as cereals & pastas have small amounts arsenic in them and if you ate too much daily, it could eventually cause cancer.  Is this a true statement?  

[cyclinglady]

Yes.  Consumer Reports issued an article about rice and apple juice a few years ago.  Trish Thompson who heads up The Gluten Free Watchdog, a mini version of Consumer Reports, has written many times about the subject.  

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This is a concern since many celiacs consume a lot of rice.  What to do?  Eat it in moderation.  Avoid brown rice (yes, it is supposed to be healthier), vary your grains, and purchase rice from areas with low levels of arsenic.  I get my rice from California.  The Southeast, I recall, has the most.  It is all about contamination in the soil which is sometimes just natural.  

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Eat a varied diet and you should be fine. 

[Ennis-TX]

You can limit grain intake and focus more on a Paleo based diet, I use keto/atkins myself. But if your body is meant for carbs and you do not have bloat issues going Paleo and using sweet poatoes, squash, etc for your carbs might work out better in the long run and avoid grains.
 

[trents]

The issue is two-fold. First, rice naturally has a much higher arsenic uptake than other common grains. Second, this natural biochemical tendency of rice is exacerbated when it is grown in areas where the soil has a high arsenic content. So, as cyclinglady said, try to control #2 in that equation. If you use a lot of gluten-free riced-based prepared food products research where they come from. Ennis' suggestion about totally changing the nature of your eating habits with regards to starches is also valid and not just for the arsenic issue.

The other thing you can look into is finding a physician who specializes in heavy metal chelation therapy. I'm not sure I buy whole hog into chelation therapy (for anything and everything I mean) but in this case it might be worth looking into.

[trents]

Here's another related question for the community.

Have any of you ever had chelation therapy to bind and remove heavy metals from your system? What do you think of this option?