How toxic is wheat?

Well, the first point is that Wheat Germ Agglutinin (WGA), the main lectin in wheat, is an insulin mimetic in tissue culture. A very good insulin mimetic. If you want to give someone, male or female, that "ten-months-pregnant" look you can either use masses of insulin, as produced by an insulinoma or perhaps have them take an insulin mimetic like WGA by mouth with every meal...

But does WGA, a protein, cross from the gut in to the blood stream intact to then have a biological effect? Well, that depends on who you ask and what dose you give. Pusztai, funded by the Scottish equivalent of DEFRA, says that, at high doses, WGA not only crosses in to the blood stream but also glues itself to the lining of blood vessels and lymphatics. I cannot think of a better way of producing an autoimmune vasculitis than sticking WGA to your blood vessels. Or of producing a massive insulin like effect, ie beer gut.

Another group of researchers, funded by the Italian government this time, say WGA doesn't cross their artificial model of the gut lining. They also found WGA wasn't heat stable, in contrast to Pusztai. But both groups do agree that WGA trashes the gut lining cells.

So these two research groups disagree about the penetration of wheat toxicity in to the body, but neither argues with the toxicity per se. I believe Pusztai is correct, especially for those poor people who regard wheatgerm, with its lectin load, as a health food. Apparently they take it in multigram doses. No thanks.

That's before we consider the effect of gliadin from wheat on gut permeability disrupting the tight junctions between enterocytes. Damaging the integrity of the gut allows all sorts of dietary proteins to gain access to the blood stream and, obviously, the immune system. I guess it helps WGA in to the circulation too.

It probably helps the two insulin stimulating peptides derived from the partial digestion of gluten in to the blood stream too.

It probably also helps WP5212 in to the path of the immune system of potential type one diabetics, allowing them to achieve their full disease potential.

I won't mention coeliac disease and schizophrenia. Or gluten ataxia. Or a host of other problems.

Today a drug rep provided pizza for lunch at work. I ate my chocolate and drank my fermented cream sitting alongside the 4 giant pizzas in the rest room. Several people asked if I wasn't tempted to indulge.

Too much information, too much toxicity and ZERO temptation.

There is no doubt about the toxicity of wheat.

Peter