Islamabad (Pakistan Point News / Online - 26th January, 2020) A recent paper outlines an intriguing new theory. The authors ask whether the microbes that inhabit the human body could transfer diseases such as diabetes and heart disease from person to person.Our resident bacteria play a role in certain diseases. Could they also be involved in passing diseases among individuals?The importance of the microbiome is currently at the forefront of scientific discourse.
Experts and the public are equally absorbed by the fascinating influence of microbes on human health.A new theoretical paper, published in the journal Science, takes the discussion one step further. The authors ask whether conditions such as cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and chronic respiratory illnesses could be transmitted from one individual to another via the bacteria, fungi, and viruses that live on and in us.Passing the unpassableHeart disease, cancer, and lung conditions are called "noncommunicable" diseases (NCDs) because they result from genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors: Therefore, they cannot be passed from person to person.
Over the last 100 years, mortality rates from communicable diseases, caused by infectious microbes, have fallen dramatically. During the same period, mortality rates from NCDs have risen sharply, now accounting for 71% of deaths globally.Researchers have demonstrated that changes in the microbiome accompany a wide range of diseases, including diabetes, Parkinson's disease, heart disease, and cancer.Limited evidenceAs it stands, evidence for this brave new theory is circumstantial, but it certainly merits further scrutiny.
The authors refer to a study of 12,067 individuals that spanned 32 years and report that "Having an obese friend was associated with a 57% higher chance of being obese, and there was a 40% higher chance of obesity if a sibling was obese."Once again, this association could be due to diet, environment, and genetics. Friends and siblings may be more likely to live in similar locations and eat similar foods. But aside from shared behaviors, the authors of the present paper wonder whether individuals might pass along certain microbes that increase the risk of developing obesity.
Obesity is a risk factor for type 2 diabetes, and if we suppose that obesity is transmissible from our microbiome to another's, it would imply that diabetes could also be considered a communicable disease.A compelling ideaMore convincingly, the authors refer to results of various studies that have found that transferring feces from one mouse with a certain disease to another mouse without that disease can cause the second animal to develop the illness; they write:In short, the authors explain that disturbances in the microbiome can produce disease and that when scientists transplant these microbial communities into another animal, that animal becomes sick. They continue:
