NHS controversy does no favours for coeliac patients

摘要

Provision of gluten-free food on prescription has been in the news recently, with reports debating the cost of these products to the NHS in the Daily Mail, the Daily Tele-graph, The Independent and BBC News, to name a few. There is a genuine debate about prescribing gluten-free food, but we need to separate the facts from the headlines and examine the evidence. Coeliac disease is a lifelong disorder, with a preva- lence of around 1% in the UK. Although alternative therapies are under development, currently the only treatment is the adoption of a gluten-free diet. Adherence to a gluten-free diet is variable, ranging from 42% to 91% (ref. 1).