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Woman Suffers Significant Weight Gain After Fecal Transplant
Beeftopia (1846720) writes In a case reported in the journal Open Forum Infectious Diseases, a woman suffering from a drug-resistant intestinal infection gained 36 pounds after receiving a fecal transplant from her overweight daughter. Previous mouse studies have shown thin mice gain weight after ingesting fecal bacteria from obese mice. The woman previously was not overweight. After the procedure, despite a medically supervised liquid protein diet and exercise regimen, the woman remained obese. Her doctor said, "She came back about a year later and complained of tremendous weight gain... She felt like a switch flipped in her body, to this day she continues to have problems... as a result I'm very careful with all our donors don't use obese people."
Figure out which bacteria the obese patients have in common that the thin ones don't, and figure out a way to eliminate it.
She wasn't overweight when she had a persistent intestinal infection and gained weight after it was cured. She might well be eating more simply because it doesn't cause her discomfort anymore, or her body uses fewer resources because it doesn't have to fight an infection, or her colon has become better at absorbing the nutrients in her food because it's no longer infected.
Worth looking into, but if your conclusion is that the bacterial composition in the colon makes people fat, you're getting ahead of yourself.
The presence of gut bacteria with such high efficiency (they ones that make you fat by being too good at their job) won't be counter-acted by the presence of the less efficient variety.
What this means, though, is that I can no longer feel the familiar sense of derision for fat people. Their obesity really may be a product of their microecology, rather than their laziness and hedonistic eating habits. Now I have to feel pity for them instead.
I guess I can still feel superior to them, since I still am physically fit compared to them...I just can't feel like this was the result of superior decisions any more.
Oh well, there are plenty of other ways to save my fragile ego.
Why boring? We've established that psychopaths are far more successful in modern society, so obviously the first thing anyone who wants the best for their children should do is have them engineered for psychopathy. Empathy is for the weak. Should make things *extremely* interesting...
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
You do realize that there 'have been studies' that show a link from pretty much anything to anything else. These sorts of studies are quick, easy and quite often, completely wrong when attempts are made to determine causality. They're like bible quotations. They can say anything you want them to say.
Statistics is hard.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Reality TV - isn't.