• remotelove@lemmy.ca
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    2 days ago

    After digging a little, I think I found the start of an answer to this. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that saline solution contains sodium chloride. (Basically table salt.) In some cases, there is a small risk of gluten cross-contamination in that salt which may lead to some irritation for people who are extremely gluten intolerant.

    This research path immediately opened up a mess of search results that I have no interest in digging through and fact checking.

    Based on some of those search results though, I would speculate that there may have been some kind of overblown social media scare about gluten in salt and some companies just started categorizing eyedrops as gluten free.

    Then, most importantly, I lost interest in this topic. Cheers!

    • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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      2 days ago

      Having recently found out I might be allergic to wheat, I also have to say I’d rather have “gluten-free” printed on the most ridiculous products than to not be quite sure. You would not believe in how many products, there’s some form of wheat (which in particular also includes barley and spelt).

      For example, I bought some vinegar recently and then saw that it contains barley malt syrup. I guess, my assumption was wrong that wheat isn’t a liquid. But I’m not even sure, if that one would be covered by “gluten-free” either.

      • remotelove@lemmy.ca
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        2 days ago

        Allergies are a very real thing but so are Facebook hypochondriacs. Some marketing departments have little regard for either and will gladly label their products gluten free if it turns a higher profit. I had an online gaming companion that bought into the bullshit so hard, he was convinced a gluten free diet was curing his sons severe autism. Sigh.

        I am bitching because the people that actually have issues always get left behind.

      • Sv443@sh.itjust.works
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        1 day ago

        Barcode comes out to saline solution too. It’s for cleaning the nose. It redundantly specifies it’s gluten free so that people with allergies know they can use it too.

  • Mistress Remilia@lemmy.sdf.org
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    2 days ago

    I moved into an apartment once that left me some free cleaning supplies as some sort of “thank you” for moving in. The cleaner liquid said it was “gluten free”. I still can’t figure that one out.

    • Ciderpunk@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Friendly local celiac here,

      Cleaning products might be used on surfaces that can be used for food prep. Cleaning agents that contain gluten may leave behind enough to cause contamination issues on subsequent uses of the surface. To be safe, using cleaners that do not have such ingredients will prevent this kind of issue.