THERE ARE TINY BUGS CRAWLING AROUND INSIDE YOU!

Linda and the author, 2010

Fecal transplants.

Now that I have your attention, let me introduce the Fred Hutch Winter Magazine, which largely is devoted to new developments in studies of what the researchers chose to call the human microbiome. You know what that is:  the trillions of tiny creatures that happily live and die inside us, everywhere, inside and out.  These creatures consist of bacteria, fungi, viruses, and other microscopic uglies left unnamed.  It is said that there are two pounds of these little creatures living in our colons alone.  Another estimate holds that on average each of us plays host to 40 trillion of the things – enough to adorn each cigarette smoked in China last year with 16 of them.  Disgusting, right?  Read on.

Recent research indicates that a lot of what you regard as “you” is strongly influenced by your particular mix of microbes.  Not only your digestion, your propensity to gain weight, or your susceptibility to disease – your microbiome even influences your sex life.  Enough people already know this that an entirely new sub-set of quackery has sprung up.  There is even mention of things called “fecal spas”.  Other equally disgusting practices are discussed.  There are definitely some instances in which messing with the microbiome is useful – it sometimes even helps with cancer.  But too little is known for the amateur to dive in head first.  So, the recommendation is caveat emptor, or for those of us born since the 19^th century, let the buyer beware. 

This really is an interesting article.  You would enjoy reading it..

http://getinvolved.fhcrc.org/site/MessageViewer?em_id=35367.0&dlv_id=35462&printer_friendly=1&s_AffiliateSecCatId=1

I wrote about this topic several years ago:

http://ljb-quiltcutie.blogspot.com/2012/11/microbes-maketh-man.html

A lot seems to have happened since.