Gluten Free Watchdog came received complaints from Nima users that Philadelphia Cream Cheese contained gluten. GFW did their testing and determined that the cream cheese indeed contained less than 20ppm of gluten. If you remember, GFW also had the same issue with Nima users complaining about Liquid IV containing gluten. GFW determined Liquid IV did not contain gluten.
In both instances, the same problem occurred – too much product (cream cheese or Liquid IV) in the Nima. GFW was able to duplicate the issue.
The Nima has always had the issue where it might show products contain gluten when they really do not. Many don’t see this issue as a flaw, rather a benefit. They are even more confident in the results when gluten is detected. Having celiac disease already greatly reduces the variety of foods we can eat. Then receiving false positives from Nima testing simply makes it harder and harder to eat.
I also think this brings up a bigger problem in the celiac community. And this one is going to be very controversial – I think we have no idea when we’ve been glutened. We think we know, but do we? My friend’s son was recently diagnosed with celiac. He didn’t have gastrointestinal issues. His issues were behavioral. About 4 months after being gluten free, she called me asking if I think her son had consumed gluten. He was complaining of a stomach ache, nausea, and a low grade fever. We went over what they had eaten in the past 48 hours. There was one thing that might have caused his issues, but maybe not. The next day she called letting me know he had the Vid. She immediately went to him getting glutened rather than the myriad of other things it could have been.
The celiac community needs tools to know how much gluten we are really consuming.
GFW’s statement on cream cheese…. https://www.glutenfreewatchdog.org/news/brief-public-summary-of-gluten-free-watchdogs-special-report-on-cream-cheese-nima-sensor-test-results/