Celiac Group Concerned about G-free Diet Book

This week has been a busy one for Elisabeth Hasselbeck.  She’s been everywhere talking about her new book on the gluten-free diet called: The G-free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide. While the awareness about celiac disease is good, the Celiac Disease Foundation is worried about inaccuracies.  The group explained their concerns in an open letter late yesterday.

Celiac Colleagues:

I am writing to call your attention to the current publicity surrounding the new book, The G-free Diet, A Gluten-Free Survival Guide by Elisabeth Hassselbeck, co-host of The View. While it is important to call attention to celiac disease, the information must be accurate – the inaccuracies in this book are potentially dangerous and detrimental to celiacs and to those yet to be diagnosed if people self diagnose and start eating GF. Our mission is to assist in getting people accurately diagnosed and the message in this book could defeat this mission. It appears that this book is being marketed as a fitness diet – eat g-free and feel so much better. Celiac is incorrectly referred to as an allergy not an autoimmune disease.

The GF diet is the medically mediated prescription that controls the condition for a diagnosed celiac. Several items in the book are misleading and inaccurate and place further limitations on the GF diet. The gluten-free lifestyle is a lifelong commitment for the diagnosed celiac, not an option, not a fad diet – adhering to the GF lifestyle requires patience and persistence. This lifestyle can not be trivialized.

Thank you.

Elaine Monarch
Founder & Executive Director
Celiac Disease Foundation

I personally have not yet read the book.  I will refer you to Nancy Lapid’s review if you would like to learn more.

I really do like the fact that celiac is getting so much “play” this week all because of Hasselbeck and her book.  However I will say when I saw her on Good Morning America on Monday, I noticed some of the above concerns as well as my own.  For example, when she talked about having celiac and being on the gluten-free diet, she didn’t actually make the link that the diet is the only successful treatment for celiac.

But then again, I liked the normalcy she brought to the diet during her appearance.  She talked about baking (and brought a big old dish of) her own lasagna and bringing her own chips and salsa to a party.

In the meantime, I will let you decide for yourself what you think of the book.  I hope to take a peek at the book soon as well.

Tags: book, Celiac Disease Foundation, G-free, Hasselbeck