ITV This Morning urged to apologise by charity after Vanessa Feltz phone in segment
19.12.2023 - 14:27
/ dailyrecord.co.uk
This Morning has been urged to apologise after Vanessa Feltz 's phone in segment on Monday morning where she made comments on coeliac disease.
Vanessa was on hand to offer advice to callers and one viewer phoned in to ask Vanessa's thoughts on her mother-in-law enforcing a gluten-free Christmas dinner as one member of the family suffers from coeliac disease.
The woman on the line explained that she has a teenage son who is a 'fussy eater' and it had left her in a bit of a predicament as he would not eat any of the food provided.
Vanessa suggested that she took her own food to the family member's house but the caller said that it wasn't allowed and Vanessa replied: "So she’s treating coeliac disease as if it’s a kind of fatal, potentially fatal peanut allergy."
The agony aunt went on to say that it was "completely unreasonable" to expect the house to be completely free of gluten.
However, show host Josie Gibson pointed out that those who suffer from the condition also need to be wary of cross-contamination, to which Vanessa replied: "But they don’t have to have any cross-contamination.
"Especially if they bring their own food from home and her 15-year-old has what he actually likes which he brings in the snack box, would be perfectly fine."
Charity Coeliac UK were outraged by the segment and penned an open letter to ITV over Vanessa's comments, referring to her advice as "ill-informed" and "dismissive."
They also accused her of "trivialising" the condition when she dismissed concerns surrounding cross-contamination, which is a huge concern for those suffering from the disease, as they can have extreme reactions to even small amounts of gluten, writes OK!.
On Twitter they said: "Today on ITV's @thismorning, coeliac disease