Microbiome First Approaches to Rescue Public Health and Reduce Human Suffering

Our plain-English summary of Microbiome First Approaches to Rescue Public Health and Reduce Human Suffering, by R.R. Dietert (Biomedicines, 2021).

The study

• Author: R.R. Dietert
• Journal: Biomedicines
• Published: 2021;9(11)
• Type of article: Review
• Cited by: 8 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher · Free full text

Abstract

The is a sequential article to an initial review suggesting that Microbiome First medical approaches to human health and wellness could both aid the fight against noncommunicable diseases and conditions (NCDs) and help to usher in sustainable healthcare. This current review article specifically focuses on public health programs and initiatives and what has been termed by medical journals as a catastrophic record of recent failures. Included in the review is a discussion of the four priority behavioral modifications (food choices, cessation of two drugs of abuse, and exercise) advocated by the World Health Organization as the way to stop the ongoing NCD epidemic. The lack of public health focus on the majority of cells and genes in the human superorganism, the microbiome, is highlighted as is the "regulatory gap" failure to protect humans, particularly the young, from a series of mass population toxic exposures (e.g., asbestos, trichloroethylene, dioxin, polychlorinated biphenyls, triclosan, bisphenol A and other plasticizers, polyfluorinated compounds, herbicides, food emulsifiers, high fructose corn syrup, certain nanoparticles, endocrine disruptors, and obesogens). The combination of early life toxicity for the microbiome and connected human physiological systems (e.g., immune, neurological), plus a lack of attention to the importance of microbial rebiosis has facilitated rather than suppressed, the NCD epidemic. This review article concludes with a call to place the microbiome first and foremost in public health initiatives as a way to both rescue public health effectiveness and reduce the human suffering connected to comorbid NCDs.

In plain English

This article is a review, which the author also called an opinion article. It argued that public health programs have failed to stop noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) because they ignore the human microbiome, the body's microbes. It is not a study of asbestos and presents no asbestos data. Asbestos was named only in two lists of exposures, one in the abstract and one in a table of "regulatory gaps", and in the title of one cited reference. The table described these gaps as exposures that, in the author's account, reached millions of people across generations before the hazard was recognized. It stated that these gaps were not tied to a lack of microbiome safety testing. Most of the article discussed published research on how microbes may affect taste, smell, feeling full, and addiction. The author linked this research to the four behaviors the World Health Organization targets: tobacco use, physical inactivity, unhealthy diet, and harmful use of alcohol. The author also stressed the first 1000 days of life, which the article said span the fetal and neonatal periods. The author concluded with a call to place the microbiome first in public health initiatives.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Review, which the author also describes as an opinion article
• Who was studied: No study population. The author discussed published studies, reports and public health programs.
• Exposure: Asbestos is named only in lists of mass population exposures, in the abstract and in Table 1, together with trichloroethylene, dioxin, PCBs, plasticizers, atrazine, triclosan and others. It is also named in the title of one cited reference. No fiber type, product, job or dose is discussed.
• Main results:
  • The author listed asbestos among "regulatory gaps" that allowed millions of people across multiple generations to be exposed before the hazard was recognized.
  • The article stated that these safety-testing gaps, which include asbestos, were not tied to a lack of microbiome safety evaluation.
  • The author contrasted microbiome research with the WHO's focus on four behaviors.
  • The author discussed research on how microbiota may affect those behaviors through taste, smell, satiety and addiction.
  • The author emphasized the first 1000 days of a baby's life, covering the fetal and neonatal periods, as a window of vulnerability.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded with a call to put the microbiome first and foremost in public health initiatives, to rescue public health effectiveness and reduce suffering from NCDs.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The author stated that the microbiome-based approaches presented are examples only, not an exhaustive list.

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: regulatory gap.

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