This is a very interesting article that points out the problems we have with gluten nowadays might be down to the changes in the way we make products – quicker and cheaper, with more pesticides and preservatives and modified grains that contain significantly more gluten than ancient grains like Einkorn (some even claim it is a super-food with health benefits) . Add this to the fact the wheat doesn’t go through the same baking processes which used to naturally reduce the gluten content and it’s easy to start to see why we are having issues.
One study they refer to even suggests bread made the old way (sour-dough process) has gluten levels of 12 parts per million – where anything under 20 ppm is considered gluten-free!!! Bread made with the same wheat but without the old lacto-fermentation (sour-dough process) had gluten levels of 75,000 ppm. That’s 3,750 times more gluten!!!
http://wholegrainscouncil.org/newsroom/blog/2012/01/research-sheds-light-on-gluten-issues