Enter any subway-tiled, hardwood-floored, exposed-bricked inner-city cafe today, and you’ll no doubt overhear someone asking the waiter if they’ve “got anything gluten-frehhh?”
Curiously, this particular breed of human can almost always be found asking the above question while wearing yoga pants and Nike Frees.
And when queried further about their particular dietary requirements, they’ll more often than not reply, casually, “No, I’m not a coeliac… but it just agrees with me.”
They’ll happily pay $15 for half an avocado smashed onto a piece of sprouted bread, which is chill – until you realise this is completely unaffordable for people who are actual coeliacs.
A new study released by University of Wollongong has revealed that the cost of a gluten-free diet is far more expensive than a usual one – with families of four paying up to 17% more for coeliac-friendly foods.
Wholemeal bread, for example, is nearly five times more expensive than its gluten-ridden counterpart.
“The most discrepant food item was actually flour, so it was 570 per cent more expensive to buy gluten-free flour than it was for plain flour, so even making things from scratch is exorbitantly more expensive,” researcher and dietician Kelly Lambert has pointed out.
The research also found that the exorbitant price of gluten-free tucker hits single men on welfare the hardest.
“In order for them to meet their food requirements for a week, they would have to spend 75 per cent of welfare on food which is just absolutely impossible,” Lambert said.
It’s just plain unfair. Lambert also pointed out that not sticking to a gluten-free diet when you’re a coeliac can lead to some pretty serious health problems, such as osteoporosis and iron deficiency, and can put people at a higher risk of developing cancer.
She reckons there’s a solution, though. We could implement a national subsidised medical food program. But nope, that won’t make the average punter’s organic acai bowl any cheaper – it’d only be available to folks with coeliac disease.
Not a bad idea, since 1 in 100 Aussies must follow gluten-free diets for medical reasons.
Source: ABC.
