Amy Neiwirth is a Columbus-based artist who makes tiny clay models of popular foods: pizzas, cakes, waffles, even retro TV dinners.
But Neiwirth, 35, doesn’t eat any of those foods herself — not the conventional versions, anyway. She’s one of the 3.1 million Americans who follows a gluten-free diet, even though she tested negative for celiac disease.
Such people are called “PWAGs,” in the medical jargon: “people without celiac disease avoiding gluten.” They’re often stigmatized as faddish foodies or placebo-addled hypochondriacs who don’t understand the science behind a serious health problem. According to a new study published this month in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, their number tripled between 2009 and 2014, while the number of cases of celiac disease stayed flat.
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