Gluten Free

shaumom

elphie754 wrote: »

So gf substitutes are full of arsenic and should be avoided? I'm sorry, but this is just fear mongering.

Not quite what I said, actually, and what I said? I do no believe to be fear mongering, honestly. If the issue in question is of such little risk that the concept is ridiculous, then sure. If I went through saying things like 'everyone knows this is the most horrible thing ever and will kill you all and no sane person should do this.' Then again, sure, that's fear mongering.

But all I said is that many rice products tends to be higher in arsenic and that, because GF substitutions tend to have higher levels of rice, this could be a concern when it comes to eating many substitutions. And this is the truth, and not the truth twisted with statistics to make it seem more of a threat than it actually is. It's of enough concern that celiacs, doctors, and even governmental regulatory bodies are paying attention.

The arsenic levels in rice are known from testing performed by consumer reports of numerous brands of rice and rice products (over 1,000) a couple years back. ( you can see some of the information on that here: http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine/2012/11/arsenic-in-your-food/index.htm). While safe levels of arsenic in food are not yet researched, there are safe levels mandated for water, and just one portion of some of the tested rice samples contained over 1 1/2 times a full day's worth of water's arsenic levels.

At the time, there was much discussion among experts about the possible implications of this, and the FDA changed its recommendation so that it now recommends parents consider foods other than rice cereal as their babies' first solid foods (after first insisting that the arsenic levels should be fine, and that we shouldn't worry until they'd researched what arsenic levels in foods ARE fine, anyway). The UK Food Standards Agency now recommends that children under five not be given rice milk as a substitute for breast milk, formula, OR cow's milk. And many doctors and members of the celiac community discussed this issue because of the known increase in rice products in the celiac diet.

If you are curious, this is a good discussion of the entire issue here.
On top of this, however, the child mentioned by the OP is on the autism spectrum according to her. Arsenic has been shown to have at least a correlation to potential cognitive issues. Like in this study, where they found that increased "urinary arsenic levels “were associated with impaired attention/cognitive function, even at levels considered safe.” Again, it's only correlation, and hasn't been studied yet to see if there is also causation. But for a child that already may have other cognitive issues already (since there is a higher risk of this happening in children on the spectrum), it's something parents may want to be aware of, and make their own decisions.

So while yeah, the idea of rice products having higher levels of arsenic than may be safe IS upsetting, especially considering GF products that have more rice than the norm, and can inspire fear for some of us, simply bringing it up doesn't make it fear mongering, you know? It's just bringing up information that may not be known, but may be important, especially for a child who may have more fragile health to begin with.