Not By Bread Alone Shall One LiveCatherine J Frompovich Todays wheat has been crossbred and tinkered with in many ways. According to nutritionist Natasha Longo, Natasha Longos excellent dissertation Why 80 Percent of People Worldwide Will Soon Stop Eating Wheat along with its apparent health-producing problems appears here. Ms. Longo does an excellent job of fulfilling all the requisites of journalism, i.e., answering most of the who, what, where, when, and why questions. Several issues concerning wheat need to be addressed. One, in particular, is giving children wheat-based snacks, i.e., cookies, pretzels, small finger-size goodies that can be harmful to digestive processes and toddlers intestinal tracts, which are not fully developed or in the process of becoming food-oriented much before two years of age, thus setting up a child for food problems. What needs to be pointed out, this writer thinks, is this: Giving infants and toddlers grains in any form to eat before children are able to chew grains and their flours well enough to provide saliva to ensalivate them, is not considered digestive-tract-friendly eating. Phytic acid in wheat is problematic for the gut, so that adds another dimension in addition to gluten problems, agricultural chemicals like glyphosate in GMO farming, and food processing chemicals, additives, and preservatives. The Weston A. Price Foundation provides an excellent primer on phytic acid and phytates here. According to an article in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, [1] humans are eating about 15 pounds of gluten per year, a 25 percent increase since the 1970s. In the chart on page 1157, its quite apparent how dramatically proteins in wheat have increased between 1925 and 1938, from 12.49% to 18.78% probably something Nature wasnt intending, but resulted from crossbreeding. Now, heres a question: If thats what happened from crossbreeding wheat, what is going on with, and from, genetically modified crops with their transgenic and cisgenic modifications, plus all the glyphosate spraying in the growing fields? This website differentiates between transgenic and cisgenic modifications Getting back to wheat, since the average slice of bread contains about 1.8 grams of gluten or 1800 mg, we need to realize that intestinal distress can occur quickly, since 50 to 100 mg of gluten per day can trigger celiac-diagnosed-patients, who are in remission, into intestinal distress. [2] However, many gluten-free foods are made with GMO ingredients like soy, corn, cornstarch, beet sugar, and chemical processing, manufacturing, and preservative additives that can interactor even trigger distresswithin an already celiac-compromised, gluten-intolerant gut. Furthermore, theres a wheat product called vital gluten, which is powdered gluten that is added to many foods, especially by professional bakeries and bakers. The closest grain to the original wheat Nature gave us is the heirloom wheat-like grain, spelt, which does contain gluten, but is more soluble than the gluten in wheat. That may be a defining factor for why spelt may work for some folks who are gluten sensitive, but needs to be considered very seriously. If one is gluten intolerant, it is best to be safe than sorry! The upshot or take-away information from this article is this: Wheat ought to be considered a dietary problem for anyone with any type of diseaseincluding obesityfrom digestive disorders to inflammatory diseases to allergies, especially young children who are on the autism spectrum disorder or have experienced any allergic reactions to vaccines, which can precipitate gut problems, digestive or intestinal distress. As a nutritionist who matriculated in natural nutrition and did research in prenatal and infant nutrition, this writer believes it is imperative that non-organically-grown food can be regarded as unsuspecting bioweapons capable of causing more disease and harm than we realize. For readers interested in more information about digestive diseases in the U.S., please see IbdCrohnsfor a book you may want to have in your health library: Notes: Her work has been published in national and airline magazines since the early 1980s. Catherine authored numerous books on health issues along with co-authoring papers and monographs with physicians, nurses, and holistic healthcare professionals. She has been a consumer healthcare researcher 35 years and counting. Catherines latest book, A Cancer Answer, Holistic BREAST Cancer Management, A Guide to Effective Non-Toxic Treatments, is available on Amazon.com and as a Kindle eBook. Two of Catherines more recent books on Amazon.com are Our Chemical Lives And The Hijacking Of Our DNA, A Probe Into Whats Probably Making Us Sick (2009) and Lord, How Can I Make It Through Grieving My Loss, An Inspirational Guide Through the Grieving Process(2008). 