gfp

According to Dr. Steven Taylor, Food Allergy Research and Resource Program, University of Nebraska, McDonald's Fries are gluten free and allergen free.

McDonald's says that based on this analysis, the company believes the lawsuits filed are without legal merit.

The press release was issued by Jack Daly, Senior Vice President, McDonald's Corporation.

Larry, as you know from working in a lab reports are not written like that...

The first page lists the method, MDL and MRL's if an MRL exists...

MRL's are legally defined and can be somewhat weird... for instance in the UK and Norway the amount of oil an oil rig can recirculate back into seawater is 100x less than the MRL in river water that is used as a drinking supply? (go figure)....

Anyway I did read the tests somewhere after they were done and they were ELISA tests ...

However here is theit statement

Small French Fries

Potatoes, vegetable oil (partially hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef flavor (wheat and milk derivatives)*, citric acid (preservative), dextrose, sodium acid pyrophosphate (maintain color), dimethylpolysiloxane (antifoaming agent)), salt. Prepared in vegetable oil ((may contain one of the following: Canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, hydrogenated soybean oil, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, partially hydrogenated corn oil with TBHQ and citric acid added to preserve freshness), dimethylpolysiloxane added as an antifoaming agent). *CONTAINS: WHEAT AND MILK (Natural beef flavor contains hydrolyzed wheat and hydrolyzed milk as starting ingredients.)

Ahh and the testing statement

Open Original Shared Link

As it relates to the hydrolyzed milk, initial testing was conducted on the French fries and hash browns using a

Neogen Veratox test at a 2.5 parts per million level of sensitivity. The Neogen Veratox test found no

detectable intact milk proteins. As it relates to the hydrolyzed wheat, initial testing was conducted on the

French fries and hash browns using a RIDASCREEN Gliadin ELISA test at a 3 parts per million level of

sensitivity. The RIDASCREEN Gliadin ELISA test found no detectable intact gluten proteins. Because

partially broken down milk or wheat proteins may be present, and they also may be clinically significant for

an individual with a milk or wheat allergy, these tests are not definitive.

Consequently, we decided that additional allergen testing be done on these ingredients using the

Radioallergosorbent Inhibition Test (RAST). The RAST test found virtually no wheat-allergic residues in the

hydrolyzed wheat ingredient. The RAST test found some milk-allergic residues in the hydrolyzed milk

ingredient. It should also be noted that the hydrolyzed milk and hydrolyzed wheat ingredients are only a

portion of the natural flavoring and that the natural flavoring itself represents a small amount of the frying oil.

Open Original Shared Link

States that the commerical ELISA test is sensistive to about 10ppm gliadin.

Open Original Shared Link

The reason these tests are used is here...

Open Original Shared Link

Compare that with your price list for quantitive analysis at ppb level for geochem samples...

a good summary here...

Open Original Shared Link

Food allergies represent an important health problem in industrialized countries

(Sicherer et al. 2003). In a sensitized individual, even the intake of minute amounts of

allergens can provoke digestive disorders, respiratory and skin reactions. For some

allergic individuals, the contact with a certain food allergen can even provoke lifethreatening

reactions (anaphylaxis).

Since no cure for allergic patients is available to-date, allergic individuals must

strictly avoid the offending allergens in their diet. Total avoidance is sometimes

difficult, as processed food usually contains a wide variety of ingredients including

potential allergens. Sensitive individuals may also be inadvertently exposed to

allergenic proteins by consumption of food products supposed to be free of a certain

allergen. Food products can be contaminated with

gfp.....you can see that tobacco is listed as a source of cadmium (a heavy metal). So yes.....indeed second hand smoke can be damaging to a persons health if they are particularly vulnerable. Cadmium is a neurotoxin. It has cumulative effects.

Yes but the expulsion of cadmium is different, not that it really matters it's only one example...

The basis of what you are saying MAKES SENSE!

.. removed stuff which I agree wityh for brevity...

Do we know *everything* there is to know about MSG?? NO...we do not....the FDA has quite a bit of power and everything that comes out about MSG will then be negated by the FDA...much the same way its been done in the past. They do not tell people that they used Aspartame in their placebo. Why hide this info.?? Why hide MSG in our food?? Why not label it if its there??

I believe the answer to the question as to whether or not MSG is harmful lies in the obvious...If its safe....why hide it????

Just to be technically correct, from what I read the FDA don't make the tests, the companies do and submit them.

Like I said the whole process is a political game... its a bit like driving test people having quotas... if they pass too many they get audited, if they pass too few they get audited so the easiest life for them is to try and just target ones they think are the most dangerous... of course office politics dictates if your boss was the one accepted MSG and you look at it again... you err on the side of agreeing with your boss!

In the paper today:

South Burlington -

Ben & Jerry's is recalling 250,000pints of its Country Peach Cobbler ice cream because the containers do not list wheat as an ingredient.

I saw this in the store the other day and passed right by, only to ASSUME that it WOULD contain wheat.

That's really a good sign though... it at least demonstrates they are willing to do recalls and hence take it seriously.

hm,

Your son got very ill after eating their fries one time. That is a fact and no amount of discussion is ever going to change your feelings about that.

I've never considered McDonalds fries all that great unlike many who just rave about how they are the best. I always preferred the other fast food places fries, such as Jack in the Box, Wendys, Popeyes. Now however, they are the only ones I'll eat because I know our location uses a dedicated fryer. My son worked there, you can see the fryers and what's going on. I've eaten the fries there quite a few times with no problems. For me, that's a fact. When and if I get sick I'll have a new perspective.

I suspect the greasiness is more of a problem for our celiac stomachs than the unmeasurable amount of wheat.

best regards, lm

Larry, its not that the levels are unmeasureable, just that they are unmeasureable with THAT test...

The MDL of gluten on ELISA tests is down in the ppm range (2-20 at best) compared to what could be measured with instrumentation .. That McDonalds chose the least accurate test just indicates they didn't want to risk the more sensitive testing... I can't honestly beleive it was a cost issue for a company the size of McD...

The real problem is that it makes it impossible to tell if its the oil or the cross cointamination seems to get many of us sick.... I strongly suspect its mostly the latter but unless McD are going to pay for GCLC to detect in ppb ranges then its hard to be sure...

Afterall it wouldn't kill them financially to do this and publish the results...

Wow. I read on the internet that I was advocating using MSG and it fooled me for a minute. I went back and re-read everything I posted.

I think that all that I said, and certainly all that I meant to say, was don't trust advocacy websites. The rest of my posts were trying to defend when my comments were taken out of context or discredited with what I saw as a imprecise analogy. For example I said "eat pure MSG all day" and someone responded with "we do eat MSG all day", leaving out the "pure" changed the point I was making. That slight restating of the point is a technique that our current adminstration (for the US board participants) has perfected.

Another example, I didn't advocate only researching 30 seconds but I pointed out that in 30 seconds I could find a website that contradicted what was being asserted. The example I cited was an FDA site (but we all know they lie about everything). There is also a food industry site that tells you MSG is harmless. Do I trust that one? NO.

Someone asked for a link to a peer reviewed study. None were provided.

The ironic part is that the strongest anti-MSG posters in this thread appear to have done research, made conclusions for themselves and when I suggest that other readers of the board do the same thing I'm compared to tobacco companies. I'm not sure if that was a step up from the "not scientific" jab. I guess I'll be Hitler by the end of the weekend.

Tim, the contention is that in the absense of clear peer reviewed papers to prove MSG is SAFE not UNSAFE.

Advocacy and anti-advocasy websites rarely provide accurate and peer reviewed papers but the example of DDT shows that in many cases the equivalent back then (The internet still being in the future) actually stimulated this...

Its not that the FDA are publishing deliberatly incorrect information as such, it is that they are not providing a peer reviewed study to show its safety....

Additionally the FDA is allowing the food manufactuers to NOT label MSG but to hide it in other formas such as hydrolised protein. The real problem IMHO is that the FDA lacks teeth... as do its equivalents in most Western Countries.

As was proven with tobacco it was left up to private class actions to finally get acceptance ...

The contention from myself is that if at least some of the stuff on advocacy sites is true then it deserves/merits a proper investigation and that we shouldn't have to wait for people to get have enough medical evidence to file a class action.

The problem is its not water nor salt, the effects of free glutamic acid are not well known... peer reviewed papers are scarce and particualrly its effects on humans... thankfully Hitler didn't win the war but iof he had you can be sure that smoking would have been banned a long time ago... Hitler was strongly anti smoking and Germany had policies in place back in the 40's that are very similar to the ones we are just getting around to today. (Of course he would proably only ban Aryans from smoking...) but also under HItler we would have been free (or encouraged) to do human testing...

Luckily we are not experimenting on people .... but this is what provides a get-out clause for the food industry...

Your answer is guitly by association doesn't work.... that is not really a logical extension... if the same people lied under oath once and are proven in court to have submitted false evidence, tampered with experiments and buried negative research and AVOID PRISON... then the logical conclusion is they will do it again.

Tobacco or food makes no difference .... ? its simply a product to be sold. Why would the same people suddenly act differently when all they got for purgury the first time was a slap on the wrists? Of course they will be more careful, they will have others present the "facts" but I see no reason as to why they would suddenly change....

In case you think my internet source for the ownership of Kraft and Nabisco and many others is "unreliable" coming from the internet it comes form their own offical website...

Yes....and this is what I posted earlier. Genetically we are all different. Some people are more capable of detoxing neurotoxins than others. Mycotoxins (toxins produced by mold) for example...these can cause serious health problems for those who are genetically susceptible to these toxins.

I assume this would apply to MSG as well....some people are going to be more suseptible to it than others. This doesnt mean that its safe for *anyone*....it just means that for some it can really impact their health and others may not reach the point that they develop disease.

Rachel, I pretty much agree... I'm just explaining the other viewpoint from Jestgar...

The same with cigarettes. Some people will be able to smoke for decades without developing cancer. Someone else may develop cancer from second hand smoke. Either way.....we know that smoking is not good for us.

Yes some people ... but the amount is really pretty minor and over stated... I'm not encouraging smoking, I'm just saying that the real evidence suggests most people don't... the question I guess is when is one life one too many? That's really a political question though...

The point is that we really dont know how well our bodies can cope with these toxins until its too late.

Again, I agree with you completely here! I also agree that since we don't know then the sensible thing is to avoid it!

Some can say that smoking in "low amounts" is not harmful. Nicotine is addictive....its not always possible for a person to smoke in "low quantities". If you could get away with that....I'm sure you wouldnt be a smoker at all. Why would you??

Again, I agree.... this is the point I'm trying to make... but seriously lots of native Americans had casual tobacco use etc. the problem really is that the tobacco companies have taken a low risk activity and manufactured it into a very high risk one.

If tobacco was smoked like native American useage (low amounts for ceremony and religious stuff) then the health risks would probably be minimal... indeed probably less than living in a city... however the tobacco companies took that natural product and removed just enough nicotine to prevent people vomiting if they smoke it all the time... its really like the manufacture of MSG from Kelp... or the Asian soups based on Kelp.... the idea is to make it something people become addicted to and then smoke all day... very similar to adding MSG to most processed foods...

Generally, people smoke because they are addicted. I was a smoker for 14 years....I got addicted in my teenage years....it happened very quickly. One day I was a "casual" smoker and soon enough I was smoking a pack a day. MSG is also addictive.....this is one of the reasons they put it in the food. They want you to buy the product.....to be "addicted" to it.....to LOVE it.

Again I entirely agree... its certainly mentally addictive because people get the taste and then food doesn't taste correct without it... but are we going to say the same for salt? This is the big question .... but we know what salt does and we don't know what MSG does!

I agree with HF.....at some point things will change......MSG will be "outed"....however, I dont think it will be anytime soon.

Again I agree...

People who smoke are risking their lives (as well as the lives of those around them).....likewise....people who consume MSG everyday are also taking a risk. Its a gamble. You may win....and you may lose.

Like I say the passive smoking case is massively overstated, I'm not sayin g it doesn't happen but its simply PC and popular to dump on smokers... HOWEVER and this is the important part, its a completely political issue.

I can explain that from a European perspective best....

The aim of the UK govt is to ban smoking and make tobacco illegal BUT too many voters smoke... however many of the voters WANT to quit... BUT ... they are scared, don't think they can etc. When they put tax up on cigs many smokers think, ah it will help me cut down or quit... so it doesn't become a decisive issue ... they can still vote for "that" party whereas if they announced their true intentions peple would panick and actually vote for another party they completely disagree with except on smoking...

My personal problem with this isn't the aim of making tobacco illegal, its the way they do it...

This is simply not true. You cannot say that we all have "thresholds" and then decide that for *most* people that threshold is anything more than 2-3 cigarettes. Its not logical....especially considering second hand smoke kills plenty of people every year. Obviously for these people their threshold was reached at zero cigarettes per day.

Again this is probably not so clear cut as this.... many passive smoking deaths have passive smoke as a possible contributing factor... (I'm really not supporting smoking, I am just trying to explain how the figures are used because it relates to MSG)

Its become popular to dump on smokers, and one guy smoking on a bench in a park when you walk past is no risk... not compared to the city.. part of this is I think the govt's looking good after ignoring the evidence on smoking for years... and partly because the tobacco companies made them look stupid, make a mockery of the justice systems etc. BUT most of all the governements did little or no research themselves on the effects n smoking, they let the tobacco companies and charities do it and guess who had far more money?

IMHO this is what is happening with MSG now.... instead of governments actually using public money to research it they delegate to the very people who will hide any bad effects. I'm betting in the future that we find that the effects are quite bad for some people and moderately bad for most people at current consumptiopn levels.... AFAIK MSG can be extracted from Kelp just by cooking it... people have been eating refined MSG for centuries in East Asia and the health problems associated are not SO BAD they jump out... of course they are only consuming a fraction of what is added to food and the amount they would consume if they switched to a Standard American Diet. This is really the crux for me.... the fact its opn a list of "relatively harmless" means it can be added in stupid quantities...

Chocolate is toxic for a bird....so is avocado. They can kill a bird......however, we are not birds and neither one of these is gonna kill us (unless we have anaphylactic allergy ).

This is the same arguament being used for MSG studies indeed this is really the whole get out for the FDA.

In the US and Europe we do tests on ANIMALS.... we are not allowed to deliberately kill humans to determine LD50 levels...

HOWEVER: The FDA ONLY accepts tests on humans.....

This is EXACTLY the way tobacco got allowed through for so long... and its as I said earlier, you have to wait for people to die from their own choice of eating a specific thing or smoking...

The whole problem was illustrated by my thalidomide example.... this was spotted by one person in the FDA... a new person, it was her first case. After a while people become jaded... passing stuff becomes a game of wearing down the regulatory bodies...

I used to do smoke stack analysis for refinaries at one point... the inspectors work 9-5 mon-fri.... the refinaries know this...they regualte their production cycle during the day keeping inside the limits then at 5PM they switch it up... you can actually watch this asa you are driving away! The stack which is meant to filter out the toxins etc. suddenly lights up as they boost production.

But .. you know when you're new you turn around and go back.. by the time you resample (if they let you without an inspector present) they have turned it down... and even if its still above the legal limit they will just say they had a technical glitch and had to dump a tank. Your interest in actually taking a relevant sample soon diminishes as you find nothing happens... your company who also does analyses for the refinhin g company tells you to stop, the idea is just to collect the sample for a negative test... everyone knows this including the inspecters but they get similarly jaded.

If you look at the record of the FDA for pulling foods labelled as NOT containing MSG when they are found to you see the same principle... oops, a little slipped in, must be contamination.. but hey MSG is harmless so no need to recall. Meanwhile the costs prevent your average Joe from having it tested themselves.

The whole thing is just a game.... however if you over state the case (or the anti MSG lobby do) this is then "evidence" that anti MSG peopel are just nuts.... like many "conspiracy theories" the easiest way to make it go away is simply to label it as a conspiracy theory and attack the credibility and motivation of those camaigning against it.

So would you say that taking these medications several times a day....for life....would be safe??

If you eat an American diet you are essentially doing this. Having "a little" MSG for breakfast, snacks, lunch and dinner....everyday...for life. Every meal...every day.

I don't thionk that's the real point... the point is there is a threshold where different effects kick in ...

Smoking 2-3 cigarettes a day for many people would have little medical effect.(compared to living in a city). except of course nicotine is addictive.. so many/most people end up sooner or later taking increasing amounts... same goes for cocaine, except its even more addictive.

An example would be a leaf from a cocoa plant. People make drinks with these and there is no harm in it.

Most people control alcohol better but the aldehydes it breaks down into are a neurotoxin but our body expels them if we keep below a threshold.

The question for me with MSG is no real public data exists to determine this threshhold... cumulative effects vs short term effects etc. The absense of this data is worrying because if it conclusively proved MSG was safe in dietry quantities it would be available, economics dictates it...

Secondly different people likely have different threshholds... different eating patterns etc. however I can't find a scrap of evidence to suggests its actually beneficial in any way...

Rice guy - the peas didn't naturally occur in the package, they were added. That's why they were on the ingredient.

The fact that a company follows the letter of the regulation, not the level you would like doesn't automatically mean there is a conspiracy.

GPF - Sorry but your guilt by association doesn't work. You are posting on the internet - some stuff on the internet is stupid - applying the logic you used would lead to the conclusion that you are stupid.

In general -

What anyone believes is right for them is fine with me. The only issue I had was stating what you believe to be true as scientific fact.

That is presumably because your not a scientist...

Science consists of hypothesis, theories and fact.

Gravity is a theory... for instance not a fact, the effects of gravity we measure are fact but the mechanism is a theory, at least for now.

The source of the information being either from the internet or other is irrelevant, there are plenty of texts books which are full of errors, indeed any science text book below undergrad level is basically errors and very few text books exist above that level and when they do they are usualy collections of papers, not text books ...

The point I am making and you seem to be missing is quite simple,

As to whether MSG is a neurotoxin that is techically true but very misleading. The FDA site cited above states that in dietary quantities there is no evidence that it kills neurons. In large quantities it apparently does kill neurons. Therefore, in the scope of this discussion - MSG in food - it is a very poor neurontoxin and at least one website actually talks about its characteristics both before and after a threshold is reached and how it has a dramatically different impact.

1) The fact is its a neurotoxin...

2) The theory is that in dietary quantities there is no evidence that it kills neurons.

However a theory is not a fact, it is by its nature a theory to be exhaustively tested for either a null or positive hypothesis,

What I haven't seen and you haven't linked to is a proper documented scientific study that proves the theory incorrect.

This is the point at which medicine deviates from science. A good scientist will take lots of people and attempt to either kill them or prove it doesn't.. true science has no morals, it is simply in a different field.

People try and apply morals but they don't work.. should we throw away data gathered by doctors who were scientists because their morals were bad? If we did this we would have no penicillin... and a lot of data gathered by the Nazi's in WWII would be unusable to save lives today. Goebels and Mengelez were very bad MD's but good scientists.

Medicine on the other hand is not science, it attemps to have morals and to cure people not kill them... whereas for science the person dying or not is immaterial (I'm not saying that is what happens, that is why we have laws)

If a theory exists that has some validity, such as the neurotoxins in MSG perhaps being harmful in dietry quantities then medicine should say that until proven otherwise that substance should NOT be considered safe. AS I mentioned earlier almost every toxin I have worked with has had the safe limits constantly decresaed as new studies indicate that lower amounts can cause problems and even death.

This is the difference between medicine and science.

When a substance potentially cuases harm and the extent of that harm is unknow sscience says its not fact... but medicine should say its a valid thoery that isn't tested.

applying the logic you used would lead to the conclusion that you are stupid.

I agree whole heartedly with Nantzie...

Almost everyoine I know who has gone back to basics 100% and absolutely no gluten has incresed sensitivity...

Take it as a sign your doing it RIGHT.

GPF - in the first section of your reply you changed the context to added MSG.

Because prior to the 60's there as no other widespread natural source of MSG... widely and regualrly eaten outside of the far east and because the quantity of MSG in kelp is low compared with the amount when it is added to food.

You can believe anything you want, just don't expect it to go unchallenged when you through it out on the internet.

Tim, the real point is I don't have to believe its ALL true, I just need to beleive there is a good chance its mostly true.

Is it a neurotoxin? I don't think any of the evidence I have seen disputes this...

Does it cause everything claimed? Frankly it doesn't need to... ! Virtually every toxin and hazardous material that is researched ends up having toxicity way below initial "safe thesholds" ... Working in and out of labs most of my life I have watched as the product advisory sheets for what were previously considered non-low-hazerdous chemicals are updated with new studies. Its virtually unknown for them to go the other way... I can't actually recount most of the most serious stuff because I or the people I worked with have signed confidentiality agreements, sorry if that sounds like a cop-out but its true.

Not everything bad about DDT is as bad as its sometimes made out to be BUT I don't intend to start eating it...

Rachel - can you point me to any study that shows that MSG has a cummulative effect?

The problem wiuth that is mutli-fold...

Firstly a large amount of that kind of data unfortunately involves someone dying and a post-mortem. This is linked to the second part which is who is going to pay for it....? The way the FDA works is companies must pay for their own testing ... OK, I see why but it allows a whole load of manipulation. This is how the tobacco companies managed to get away with saying no hard evidence existed for so long... unfortunately you often need people to start dying before public money (the coroners office) becomes involved.

Just answer this question, do YOU trust the tobacco companies ? Bear in mind they are proven in court to have hidden and destroyed evidence...

If you don't then these are the same companies own Kraft, Nabisco etc.

That is the type of logic that has people organizing to ban dihydrogen monoxide (Open Original Shared Link).

I don't want to hear conspiracy theories and circumstantial evidence, I want facts. The post above about marmite is a classic example. He mentions that peas are labeled as containing "peas" but marmite doesn't list MSG. That sort of logic is scary. MSG occurs naturally in lots of products. Labeling laws only require things added to be listed. The peas don't list all of their chemical structure. Also, there appear to be different brands of marmite so this might not be universal but the one site I read said marmite contains a compound analogous to MSG, not that it contained MSG.

Most things that we consume would be bad for us in excessive quantities. Would it be bad if you ate pure MSG all day? Of course. No one on this thread has cited any peer-reviewed study that shows MSG is harmful in dietary quantities.

No its completely different!

Dihydrogen monoxide is essential and normal part of our diet and makes up 90% of our body... MSG is neither.

Added MSG is relatively new, it has only been added since food processing has become popular which also coincides with legislation in most countires...

A better comparison is thaldidomide ... had it not been for one person (Kelsey who was new to the job and less indured than her longer standing compatriates) it would also have been passe in the USA... asit was it still managed to be prescribed ion a trial basis. One might also wonder if had it been discovered by an American company if that could have also aided its approval.

If you think that one is too extreme there are lots more examples... perhaps tobacco is the most obvious and appliucible since most of the food prcoessing companies are owned by the tobacco companies. Indeed in the most part the big ones like kraft and nabisco just get passed from one tobacco company to another ....

The tobacco companies had plenty of research showing links to cancer, they just didn't publish it.. why would they?

This is normal company activity... its not like the tobacco companies are doing anything other types of companies don't do... their duty is to maximase profit for shareholders and stay within the law by whatever means necassary, including lobbying and hiding studies unless subpoened to release them.

As an example Ford released the Pinto with a known fatal defect... this is proven in court... they simply did the math and looked at the price they might have to pay in compensation vs how much a redesign would cost. It was simply cheaper to accept it would kill some peope and they would pay compensation.

Years later they did the same with the Explorer, made the same calculation and decided to release it anyway with at least two different fatal defects...

So there is a hige difference in bringing a new product to market and simply claiming water is a dangerous chemical... indeed one wonders who funds the dhmo.org ?? However the real point is why can't I find hundreds of studies made showing MSG to be safe? All I find is half done studies saying its inconclusive? Where are all the documented studies with data showing it to be safe?

I could go on and on... asbestos was totally safe... DDT was so safe the manufactuers had their children eat in pure... on TV!

Doubts about DDT's environmental effects grew out of direct personal observations, usually involving a marked reduction in bird life, later supplemented by scientific investigation. The first recorded group effort against the chemical involved several citizens, including one or more scientists, in Nassau County, NY. Their unsuccessful struggle to have DDT regulated was reported in the New York Times in 1957, and thereby came to the attention of the popular naturalist-author, Rachel Carson. New Yorker editor William Shawn urged her to write a piece on the subject, which developed into her famous 1962 bestseller. Despite the uproar surrounding Silent Spring, DDT remained in use.

They do what they have to to get the results they want.

because the placebo is specifically chosen to duplicate the adverse effects they expect to find.

Conflicting Studies

* DDT is classified as "moderately toxic" by the US National Toxicological Program and "moderately hazardous" by WHO.[34] It is not considered to be highly toxic, and in fact it has been applied directly to clothes or used in soap.[35] Indeed, DDT has on rare occasions been administered orally as a treatment for barbiturate poisoning.[36]

* The EPA, in 1987, classified DDT as class B2, a probable human carcinogen based on "Observation of tumors (generally of the liver) in seven studies in various mouse strains and three studies in rats. DDT is structurally similar to other probable carcinogens, such as DDD and DDE." Regarding the Human Carcinogenicity Data, they stated...". The existing epidemiological data are inadequate. Autopsy studies relating tissue levels of DDT to cancer incidence have yielded conflicting results. Three studies reported that tissue levels of DDT and DDE were higher in cancer victims than in those dying of other diseases (Casarett et al., 1968; Dacre and Jennings, 1970; Wasserman et al., 1976). In other studies no such relationship was seen (Maier-Bode, 1960; Robinson et al., 1965; Hoffman et al., 1967). Studies of occupationally exposed workers and volunteers have been of insufficient duration to be useful in assessment of the carcinogenicity of DDT to humans.".[37]

* A recent study conducted by the University of California, Berkeley suggests children who have been exposed to DDT while in the womb have a greater chance to experience development problems.[38]

* Direct studies have not found a link between DDT and breast cancer in humans.[39][40]

* Some evidence suggests a link between DDT and breast cancer in humans. For example, diminishing rates of breast cancer in Israel have paralleled a precipitous decline in environmental contamination with DDT and benzene hexachloride.[41][42][43][44][45]

* Dr. Mary Wolf published a 1993 article in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute indicating a statistically significant correlation between DDT metabolites in the blood and the risks of developing breast cancer in the general population. Others have disputed this research.

* In one 1969 study, 24 cynomolgus monkeys and rhesus monkeys fed 20 mg/kg of DDT for 130 months were compared to a control group of 17 monkeys. The study demonstrated "clear evidence of hepatic and CNS toxicity following long-term DDT administration." Although the exposed group developed two malignancies and three benign tumors, compared to zero in the control group, statistically this is still "inconclusive with respect to a carcinogenic effect of DDT in nonhuman primates".[46]

* A study of 692 women, half of them control subjects, over a period of twenty years established no correlation between serum DDE and breast cancer. DDE is a metabolite of DDT, and correlates with DDT exposure.[47]

* A study examined 35 workers exposed to 600 times the average DDT exposure levels over a period of 9 to 19 years. No elevated cancer risk was observed.[48]

* In another study, humans voluntarily ingested 35 mg of DDT daily for about two years, and were then tracked for several years afterward. Although there was "suggestive evidence of adverse liver effects", no other adverse effects were observed.[49]

* A review article[50] in The Lancet concludes:

Although DDT is generally not toxic to human beings and was banned mainly for ecological reasons, subsequent research has shown that exposure to DDT at amounts that would be needed in malaria control might cause preterm birth and early weaning, abrogating the benefit of reducing infant mortality from malaria. ... DDT might be useful in controlling malaria, but the evidence of its adverse effects on human health needs appropriate research on whether it achieves a favourable balance of risk versus benefit.

The real question is ... in the light of inconclusive evidence should we continue to use it until we find it definately does or does not have significant health risks? Because its use as an anti-malarial control this is even more debatable.. since it has useful health benefits as well... MSG has no documented health benefit.

Likewise should we discontinue use of thalidomide on leprosy victims? (leanred that from House) but also it has a use as an anti malarial... where is the cover up? Why is it on the banned list since the worst effects are limited to pregnant women? Surely its safe to give it to a 5 yr old boy with leprosy or malaria?

This is my real problem.... many medications are withheld... some can have no bad effects really since they are last ditch attempt on people with terminal illness... where is the logic? Ooh don't give them heroine they might get addicted .... do you think they care when they have a week to live and heronine is far more effective than morphine?

Similarly many asthma medication is banneed by the FDA.... Why? because the anti tobacco lobby group have a huge slush fund to make sure any new drug taken through an inhaler is banned before it ever gets out.

Asthma-inhaler ban backed

By ANDREW BRIDGES

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Not to stray off-topic...

I've found shapes of pasta in the package other than what is supposed to be there. It's happened a few times, and also with plain frozen veggies. Just recently I opened a bag of carrots and there was a kernel of corn among them. I would agree though that it's probably more likely that the piece you got did come from the other pot. I can't tell you the number of times a piece of pasta suddenly leaps out of the pot as if under it's own power. Though I'm guessing you only had one pot uncovered at any given time.

LOL, it could be that.... fact is I don't know.... you'd think I would be able to think back and identify a risky time but it just magically happened like it grew legs and jumped out of the pan into the other?

This is the weird thing.... and its easy to look for excuses when I was probably just absent minded? Which is my point really, with something like cooking it approaches a semi autonomous reaction. Especially basic stuff... Am I the only one who screws up the simplest food .. like grilling toast or making plain rice? I can cook a 5 course meal for 200 people and have everything perfect ... but I can't do a damned toast? The reason cooking for 200 people takes a lot of concentration whereas sticking a toast under the grill (gluten-free of course) doesn't so I do it without really thinking like 90% of my cooking its mainly habit...

There are absolutely no references. How do you know anything he said is true?

Fair point, but how do you know its not true?

More to the point really IMHO is what if it might be true and what about the "public" studies saying its not true?

For 50 yrs we had studies saying conclusively that tobacco smoking was not conclusively linked to lung cancer! (yes I realise that's a double negative) and a non sequitur because that's deliberate

Towards the end of the 50 yrs or so this continued, even when it was "public knowledge"... and only a fool believed otherwise but the tobacco companies continued stating no conclusive evidence...

In many way's you (Jestgar) are probably luckier than I.... in terms of whom you have worked for... one thing stands out on the interview being that it is very easy to manufacture a study to prove a negative or inconclusive result... I've said this a few times for instance on the testing of McDonalds fries... Climate change is another example... and I'm as guilty as anyone for providing evidence against it... I was just a cog in an engine doing my job... but do I believe my own research? Not one bit because the research was specifically tailored to cast doubt.

I've said before that fruit is mainly treated with all sorts of preservatives and kept for a year or more... and many people here still don't want to believe it. I found out accidentally, my ex worked for a food testing lab and sometimes had to pick the stuff up from the warehouses.. I've posted links here to some of the companies making the technology... and of particualr interest here is that strains of candida are routinely used on many kinds of fruit before being sealed in with a chitin based sealant.

Personally I have nothing against chitin, but then I'm not Jewish (the primary commercial source are shrimp ).... but doesn't it strike you as odd that noone really knows about this? (Nothing wrong with chitin in mammalian diets, balein whales eat tons of the stuff daily and seem to live long lives on it)

Perhaps the strangest part of this is how this stuff is hidden from us.... it reminds me of Douglas Adams ..

An SEP field is a generated energy field which affects perception. Entities within the field will be perceived by an outside observer as "Somebody Else's Problem", and will therefore be effectively invisible unless the observer is specifically looking for the entity. This effect is greatly heightened if the entity within the field is already unexpected or out of place. The primary example of this was given in the third book Life, the Universe and Everything, when a spaceship built to look like an upside down bistro utilizes a SEP field to land unobserved in the middle of Lord's Cricket Ground. Another example occurs when the aforementioned ship's field is extended so that the characters fail to notice the fact that they cannot breathe or the fact that the asteroid that they are standing on does not have enough gravitational force to hold them down, and thus are able to breathe and stay grounded. It should be noted that a SEP field won't render an object invisible if it is expected to be there, and an SEP-cloaked object may be noticed out of the corner of the eye.

The SEP field requires much less energy than a normal invisibility field (a single torch battery can run it for over a hundred years) due to the natural propensity of people to see things as Somebody Else's Problem.

Fiction or fact?

Studies show this to be fact....

This was reported on clearly by Daniel J Simons and Christopher F Chabris of Harvard University in their study "Gorillas in our midst: sustained inattentional blindness for dynamic events" (Harvard University, 1999). This study discusses subjects who were told to carefully watch a televised basketball game and count the number of passes made or other similar tasks. Most of the subjects failed to notice when the scene changed in various ways, such as the ball being thrown off court (with the players continuing to mimic passes), or exchanging all the male players for women. In the most dramatic example, nearly half the viewers failed to notice a woman carrying an umbrella and a man in a gorilla suit walking across the screen in the middle of the video.

These huge warehouses are in our midst... they are not hidden away underground bunkers but boring, non discript yet huge buildings. We walk/drive past and never give them a second thought....

So these studies are ridiculously easy to hide.... noone has to prove the product is safe, just cast doubt that the product must be safe... and come up with inconclusive results.

We "presume" that these products were thoroughly tested without considering the manufactuerers designed the testing.

We are all so busy with our lives that like the people counting passes we don't even notice a man in a gorilla suit walking across the pitch. Most UK celaics presume 200ppm must be SAFE... Why... ?? Well we wouldn't have set the limit at 200ppm gluten unless it was? No because this is the figure the food industry settled on as acceptable. Indeed considerable evidence exists that 200ppm is NOT SAFE...

The strangest part is that those whom are involved in testing/legislating are in many cases just as ready to beleive as we are....

I have worked with research scientists on "cooked" studies. We all know we were making it up... and the tests were invalid but yet a year later someone will cite the same study they worked on as if its actually fact???

Whatever your personal politics, watch some Penn and Teller ... at least they are up front about conning you in front of your own eyes.

You guys have kind of been dancing around this lately...so are you saying that my hamburger dreams are just about enough of a dx as my dietary proof?

Margaret

If they are recurrent and REALLY about hamburgers but if yoor fixating then its got to have some reason... people who quit drugs often dream about the drug... and gluten is a drug so if you spend a long time feeling withdrawal during the day this can manifest itself as a dream at night. But Im no shrink

No one disputes the fact that MSG is a neurotoxin or that it "excites your neurons to death". That's a fact. The dispute is over whether or not this reality does enough damage to your brain to be considered bad for you. Just open your eyes and look around at the medical news reports in the U.S. Our citizens are the sickest in the "developed world". Our rates of alzhiemers is staggering. Our rates of all diseases rivals the third world countries. Our newborns die at a rate ranked third most in the world. We are poisoning ourselves with blind ambivilance for the sake of convenience. And placating our guilt by accepting the "studies" done by those who stand to profit. I'm a health advocate. I don't get paid. I'm telling you that the truth is not in some shady, grey area. MSG is bad for you.

Another thing we agree on....but the reason for the US being so sick is probably far more complex than MSG... or even just processed food....

However... lots of things are toxins.. and frankly there is little you can eat that isn't in some way...

As an example look at the Soy advocacy sites... and spookily its a huge commerical crop in the US.... and the FDA are fence sitting because of the effect on the farmers and economy...

But I also think it is a little grey area... alcohol is also a neurotoxin... or at least its breakdown products are...

In France all alcohol ads carry "Consume in moderation" ...

Personally I try and avoid soy and MSG... but not like I avoid gluten... I won't buy a packet containing it but I'll occasisionally eat soy shoots or use a little soy sauce... Its one of those things I think we are all better without... but also the body can cope with a little. We loose brain cells every day... but eating something regualrly you know destroys them just seems stupid to me... so I do like they say with alcohol and consume in moderation... which is as close to non as I can easily get without cutting out what I can eat too severely....

Hmmm perhaps a better explanation... say I hadn't eaten for 2 days... I still would not eat gluten but if I got the opportunity for some food containing soy or MSG I'd probably eat it because not eating for 2 days isn't healthy either...

In general i find it all disspointing ... I just don't eat it usually...

VERY rarely I get some and I usually toast it etc.

Problem is once you open it it gets even harder ... you might not have thought it possible but they are planning on using it on the next shuttle mission to replace the defective tiles!

Are those percentages of people with biopsy-diagnosed celiac? Because if so, it would leave out a huge number of people with neurological symptoms but without villous atrophy, and who knows what the percentages of different genes might be if those people were included.

Nope...

I think it's pretty obvious you have a neurological presentation of celiac disease, why else do you think you get so depressed when you eat it?

I'm late to the thread so forgive me for getting back to the beginning point - when I first went gluten free and started feeling better, I also kept forgetting that I have it, and doubting that I have it, especially since I also don't have an official diagnosis. I used to have nightmares about eating gluten without thinking and then remembering halfway through a pizza or something that I shouldn't eat it. And wake up spitting, lol. I never did cheat in the end but it took a while before I was ok with just not eating gluten and not thinking about it all the time.

Pauliina

Seriously that was my first thing I said on this thread... if you have cravings then its affecting you... heck I eat lots of rice but I wouldn't miss it if I stopped... not as in a craving....

Since you have an actual doctors celiac diagnosis, why would you want to poison yourself with gluten? I understand that you are still not feeling well, but I really think that it is not a good idea for you to eat gluten. Eating gluten as a celiac can cause you other health problems later on, so just be careful.

You could try to eliminate dairy or soy temporarily to see if you feel better.

I honestly agree!

Seriously I think you have probably been getting cross contamination or hidden gluten...

And... I LOVE FOOD TOO..... there is so much that can be made gluten-free... it really shouldn't limit you at home...

All my favotire recipes are naturally gluten-free... not using gluten-free bread or substitutes... because they really don't work for me in most cases...

REAL cooking ... that's what I love and live for!

I would say:

1. The current definition of Celiac (as only villus destruction or only dh) is incomplete.

2. The identified "Celiac" HLA gene(s) are only the villi destroying genes, the others haven't been identified (because a more complete view of the disease hasn't been recognized).

3. If gluten makes you feel bad, then it's doing something bad to your body.

You can slap yourself over and over and never get a visible bruise, but after a while it's really gonna hurt...

Thanks... I bow to the expert (from the rock guy )

On the last one this is exactly as I see villous atrophy...

DON'T DO THIS... (boy do I need that disclaimer but I got in all sorta of trouble before! ) ...

If you rub your hand against a hard object like a table top nothing happens.. only it does, it sloughs off some cells, no big deal the replace and they are meant to .you can do this everyday for 5 mins and have no discernable effects... BUT if you do this for 12 hours straight, not even pressing hard you'll have a massive bleeding sore...

The cells don't regenerate fast enough...

If your suceptibility of the villi is low and/or your in great health otherwise then the villi cells divide and repair... however its still causing damage... and forced cell replication increases the risk of bad mutation and cancer...

The cells of the villi evolved to self repair at a certain rate... whereas stomach lining cells are designed to be digested and self repair daily... hence their DNA programming leaves mcuh less chance of mutation.

The same happens if you are ill, pregnant etc. or just get older... the bodies ability to self-regenerate slows down... indeed recent studies have linked Alzheimers with celiac disease.... not surprising IMHO because the regeneration of cortical tissue is impeded by the bodies ongoing attempts at reparing the villi its so busy destroying... not to mention the blood brain barrier transmital.

See the photo of the brain MRI.... seriously Jerry.. take a look! Its this type of manifestation REALLY keeps me gluten-free... scares the pants off me in fact!

Interesting stuff. This guy states that Within the group of patients with neurological disease and gluten sensitivity (defined by the presence of anti-gliadin antibodies) we have found a similar HLA association to that seen in patients with celiac disease: 70% of patients have the HLA DQ2 (30% in the general population), 9% have the HLA DQ8, and the remainder have HLA DQ1. The finding of an additional HLA marker (DQ1) seen in the remaining 20% of our patients may represent an important difference between the genetic susceptibility of patients with neurological presentation to those with gastrointestinal presentation within the range of gluten sensitivity

Does this mean, since I'm HLA-DQ 3,1, that I have a greater susceptibility to the neurological presentation of celiac disease?

IMHO... it means you are less susceptible to the gastro-intestinal symptoms ... which isn't quite the same thing... I play with statistics for a living so... I have a different way of looking at this data

Also, this guy makes it sound like 70% of celiac disease patients have HLA DQ2, 9% have HLA DQ8 and "the remaining have DQ1". Does this mean that Enterolabs statement that I do not have one of the Genetic markers for celiac disease may not be entirely correct? According to this guys research, he makes it sound like about 20% of celiac disease patients have HLA DQ1...I'm not sure if that's what he's saying...

Clear as mud...right??j

As I understand it... Hasjzxxjddx (or however its spelled ) is looking at a different criteria... he is linking serology for specific gluten anti-bodies with his specialist field which is neurology... he isn't really interested in the GI stuff, its not his field... HOWEVER he's doing it professionally... the way he presents the data is so that others who are specialists in GI can use the same data...

He is specifically interested in patients with neurological manifestations, with or without accompanying villous atrophy..

However IMHO (from a scientific standpoint) he is doing this correctly... he starts off with the specific anti bodies and then looks for symptoms associated, GI's in general are not doing the same .. they are looking for biopsy proven celiacs ... The data from hasj... is based on a specific test... or set of tests which are the root of the problem... wheras the data for GI's is only looking at those with GI symptoms..and in particular one symptom...

Fine is again focussed on the digestive system so his data is biassed towards this... indeed I think his lack of publishing is because of this and because we don't understand celiac disease enough (nor genetic markers) to start from this end of the puzzle.

Remember the Rubicks cube....

Its like Fine is starting off with a mixed up cube, one he knows should be solvable but he hasn't got all the techniques... it doesn't mean he's wrong .. what it means is he hasn't got all the "moves" together to start and solve the puzzle.... and someone might have actually sabataged it and twisted one piece and put it back rotated so it will never solve...

Haj... is starting off the the brand new cube, already solved (serology) and then he's taking steps away... move 2-3 then put them back.. then 5-6 etc. etc. but each time making sure he can put back the puzzle. There are of course millions of different ways to solve the puzzle from a fixed starting point... but Hadj is limiting himself to the ones he can solve and document...

This is WHY IMHO he has produced useful and peer reviewed data and Fine has not....

HOWEVER.... Fine is also concentrating more on being a MD than a scientist... he is putting helping his patients before research...

We all come from diverse places spiritually. I believe it is a personal issue. And on this forum, I feel that it should remain personal. I, too, have very strong beliefs about religion, but this is not to place for it.

As history reveals, religion can light fires here on celiac.com. Why don't we put this one out.

Absolutely and Carla explains WHY so well..

Jesus was a teacher, there are probably many lessons in each passage. That's why two different people can read the same thing and have it speak to them in different ways.

Its one thing to discuss differences in intepretation, its quite another to insist your interpretation is the ONLY one and EVERYONE else must be wrong...

and its not only celiac.com... religion has been lighting fires since before Christianity... since it was first thought of... entirely because of the differences in interpretation of essentially the same good stuff ... and whenever someone claims their interpretation is the only one fires get lit!

Some folks have related that their reaction to gluten is delayed somewhat. For some people this can apparently be several days. So I wouldn't leap to any conclusions until a sufficient amount of time is allowed for any reactions to occur. Also, some report having to eat gluten over a period of time (rather than just once) in order to get a reaction.

As for not feeling any better after 14 months, that does seem a bit long without improvements. It took six months for me to notice anything, so I know it can take at least that long though. Perhaps the comment by kbtoyssni that you may not be 100% gluten-free is a reason. You'd have to recheck your dietary choices to be certain I guess.

I'm 3rding the comment by kbtoyssni...

The starches I mentioned can be used in the situations you've given here. When it comes to the thickening capacity, I believe it is the starch portion which is the desirable one. Though fiber can soak up water, it doesn't result in that creamy type of texture. So if the flour has a notable amount of fiber, it can work against the goal. I'd have to guess this is why wheat flour tends to give a gritty type of texture. Tapioca flour on the other hand is essentially the same as the starch AFAIK, and I've used the flour for thickening, which works well (if a tapioca pudding type texture is desired).

Its not the same.. but its not important really is it?

on the original question...

georgie, like Ursa says.... your not STUPID.... you are HUMAN ....

We all make mistakes... that is part of what makes us human!

I've worked in labs and when I was younger I thought the safetly procedures were stupid.... even common domestic cleaning products in a lab are locked away, you need to sign them in and out.. etc. As I worked in more labs I started to see the results of human nature expressed as some VERY severe injuries, I have one friend I used to work with lost half his face... and that was with a common household cleaner (carbon tetrachloride or dry cleaning fluid, also used for dabbing off chewing gum etc.)

I personally set my arm on fire and I worked with a guy lost a foot by not follwong safely proicedures with NaOH... (drain cleaner)..

Now I'm older and wiser I see the reason behind this ... its murphy's law... what can go wrong probably will, especially when its something you do regualrly...

Keeping wheat flour in the kitchen is just the same.. sooner or later it will go wrong... I once cooked pasta in two seperate pans and two seperate spoons etc. drained in seperate seives ... halfway through eating my gluten-free stuff which was shells I found a spiral .... to this day I can't say HOW it got mixed in... I was certain I had observed procedures... and remember I'm used to working in labs with VERY dangerous chemicals ...

Believe me I've dealt with my share of doctors wearing blinders.

So I did test positive for the antibodies..IF..you count an Enterolab diagnosis as positive proof of

Gluten Intolerance... That seems to be open for debate and quite honestly I don't know how I feel about Enterolab. The guy is either brilliant and on the cutting edge, or he is convinced that everyone has Gluten Intolerance...or both. The real test is how you react to the gluten-free diet...

So who do you believe..

-Doctors wearing blinders who have no real understanding of Gluten Intolerance or Celiac.

-Maverick docters like Dr. Fine who think everyone has Gluten Intolerance and that it's a vast undiagnosed problem.

-Your own body, which if you listen closely to, will tell you what you shouldn't be eating....

Questions I don't have the answers to, except I think listening to your own body is the best option.

Firstly, yes listen to your body

Did you try the two papers I linked to?

The reason I asked is because I share a certain scepticism for Dr. Fine... I don't not beleive it...I just want to see some published clinical trials... However the ones I posted ARE clinical trials and real medical papers with everything done correctly...

I look at it like we are at a juncture as we were in 1492.... Is the world really flat? Columbus had some serious doubters but do you think even his supporters were 100% convinced at the time? He had all the scientific proof and a bunch of tradition that said the world was flat and he'd fall off the edge, and if that wasn't enought he was sentenced to death in his absense by the Pope for even thinking the worlkd might be round.

Part of his sucess might be attributable to this... do you think he never doubted? But given he had a fleet following him the with sole aim of taking him back to be burned alive proably provided a bit of extra motivation

Even after Columbus found America he still faced many people not believing... even after Magellan circumnavigated, people didn't all believe... some people don't believe even today with photo's from space...

In this context MD's today mainly belive what they learned in med school. They chose to ignore the evidence to the contrary but just as the world was ALWAYS round so I believe celiac disease has always been an expression of gluten intolerance.

To take another example ... the role of h. pylori in ulcers was disputed by most MD's for years... regardless of the evidence Marshal presented many MD's refused to believe it ... indeed many wrote to medical journals condeming him as a quack...

The point is they just refused to look at the evidence ... or even conduct tests, they just dismissed it because "everyone knew" ulcers were caused by stress and treated with ranitidine and couldn't be cured.

Hadjivassiliou is in the same position now, he's not even claiming to have discovered this... he's pointing out its been known since

In 1961 Taylor published an immunological study of celiac disease.6 In his paper he commented that " . . .an obstacle to the acceptance of the immunological theory of causation has been the lack of satisfactory demonstration of antibodies to the protein concerned". He went on to demonstrate the presence of circulating antibodies against gliadin (antigliadin antibodies), the protein responsible for celiac disease. This provided further evidence that celiac disease was immunologically mediated and that the immune response is not confined to the mucosa of the small bowel. Antigliadin antibodies became a useful screening tool for the diagnosis of celiac disease.

However he also points ot WHY.... because at the time serology was difficult and expensive... it was much easier to stick a tube down someones throat...(well easy for the MD...) and so this was "sold" as the golden test...

"What do I do with a patient with positive anti-gliadin antibody test but normal duodenal biopsy"

Only one third of the patients with neurological disorders associated with gluten sensitivity have villous atrophy on duodenal biopsy. Even some with biochemical markers of malabsorption such as low serum vitamin B12, low red cell folate, or vitamin D concentrations had normal conventional duodenal histology.17 These cases may illustrate the patchy nature of bowel involvement in coeliac disease and the inaccurate interpretation of duodenal biopsies by inexperienced histopathologists. Preliminary data based on staining of the subpopulation of T cells in the small bowel epithelium suggests that these patients have potential celiac disease.24 There are, however, patients where the immunological disorder is primarily directed at the nervous system with little or no damage to the gut. Our practice is to offer a gluten-free diet to these patients unless the HLA genotype is not consistent with susceptibility to gluten intolerance (that is, other than HLA DQ2, DQ8, or DQ1). All patients are followed up and any clinical response is documented.

Anyway, this is n't just a renegade MD.... there are hundreds of researchers who agree... HOWEVER very few of them are enterologists! That might seem weird until you consider the enterologists are specialists in one specific area and also not really interested in finding "their disease" might actually not be a enterology issue after all. Many of Columbus' enemies were not against him on pure religious grounds but the Vatican had a monopoly on several of the most important commodities if the time... Alum for fixing dyes and the like... and due to the rise of Islam the traditional sources since Roman times were off limits... circumnavigation promised a way around this (pun intended) ... and a lot of rich middle men stood to loose fortunes..

Lots of enterologists make good money doing invasive tests... its not s much they are bad .. they just have to chose which side and the one which makes them money is easiest...I'll just point out these are the same GI specialists who were so against Marshals CURE for h. pylori induced ulcers!

They were wrong then.... what's the chance they are wrong now?

To me its not even chance, the evidence is available, in abundance they are just refusing to read it and test it... just good old stubborness and self interest!

The best thing YOU can do is read that evidence yourself!

Nope, wasn't me. Haven't been back to Bloomington since they gave me a diploma and asked that I not return. Some crap about "pulling down their academic standards"

You owe me a glass of wine... just spat it all over the table and monitor....