Going gluten-free for no reason may risk health – study

People without coeliac disease who go gluten-free could be unwittingly increasing their risk of cardiovascular disease, a study published today in the British Medical Journal suggests.

Dietary gluten triggers inflammation and intestinal damage in coeliacs and is connected to an increased risk of heart disease which can be reduced after treatment with a gluten-free diet.

However, long-term dietary intake of gluten among non-coeliacs is not associated with an increased risk of heart disease but restricting gluten may lead to a low intake of wholegrains, associated with cardiovascular benefits, the study found.

It prompted researchers to say the promotion of gluten-free diets among non-coeliacs should be discouraged.

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Avoidance of gluten among non-coeliacs has increased in recent years, partly owing to the belief that it can have harmful health effects. Irish people increased their spend on such products by €25 million over the past 12 months, and one in five consumers now regularly buys gluten-free products and the market in the Republic is worth about €66 million each year.

But despite the trend towards low-gluten or gluten-free diets, no long-term studies have assessed the relation of dietary gluten with the risk of chronic conditions such as coronary heart disease in people without the disease.

Scientific data

The absence of scientific data prompted a team of US-based researchers to examine the association of long-term intake of gluten with the development of coronary heart disease.

They analysed data on 64,714 female and 45,303 male US health professionals with no history of coronary heart disease who completed a detailed food questionnaire in 1986 that was updated every four years through to 2010.

Consumption of gluten and development of coronary heart disease was monitored over this 26-year period. After adjusting for known risk factors, no significant association between estimated gluten intake and the risk of subsequent overall coronary heart disease was found.

However, further analyses suggest that restricting dietary gluten could result in a low intake of wholegrains, which are associated with lower cardiovascular risk leading the researchers to warb that “promotion of gluten-free diets for the purpose of coronary heart disease prevention among asymptomatic people without coeliac disease should not be recommended”.