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Transcript of “How to overcome low grade inflammation”

Endotoxemia (LPS) is contributes to the low grade inflammation associated with obesity – but it shouldn’t be circulating, house keeping should sweep it away

You’re ON FIRE……

It is not a raging inferno, but a smouldering bush fire.

Behind the scenes, your body is engaged in a “imaginary” battle, it thinks it’s fighting invaders, but truth be told, it’s fighting you.

This low grade inflammation causes collateral damage….

It’s implicated in

• Obesity
• Cardiovascular disease
• Cancer
• Neurodegeneration
• You name it.

What’s up ? Why does the body, go to war, for “NO REASON” ?

Endotoxemia lights the fire

One of the factors implicated in this low grade inflammation, is LPS (lipopolysaccharide), whirling around in the circulation. It’s referred to as endotoxemia.

Toxemia. Sounds serious.

It is….

Some bacteria, wear an LPS overcoat.   So, the presence of LPS in the circulation, suggests an invasion.

Bacteria in the blood = blood poisoning or septicaemia.

This is LIFE THREATENING, so the immune system NEEDS to move in, fast and furious…………… or you’re toast.

Mmmmm….

You take off your overcoat

But, an overcoat isn’t always on someone. In fact, typically, overcoats are only worn, when you’re OUTSIDE. Bacteria arriving in the GUT, do wear overcoats. But, as they settle in to Hotel Colon, they frequently take them off.

They’re pretty untidy.

They just step out of them and leave them behind…………. so abandoned overcoats, can be found all over HOTEL COLON.

NOTE : Unlike you and me, we’d have to go back and find our coat, when we’re ready to leave, bacteria just grow a new one.

Picking up abandoned coats

Fortunately, one of the members of the hotel complex cleaning crew, IAP (intestinal alkaline phosphatase), produced by the cells lining the gut, sweeps through on a regular basis, picking them up and dismantling them.

This is most helpful.

It keeps the levels low, so few if any overcoats get swept across the border, into the blood, where the ever vigilant security system, can “see” them and ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE.

Clean up on…….

If you’re on FIRE………………. your hotel staff aren’t doing their job properly.

Now when staff don’t do their job well, smart businesses hire a consultant to figure out, just what the problem is. A group of researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, set about uncovering why endotoxin was slipping through.

Were there too many overcoats ? Or was it too few cleaning staff on duty ?

Counting overcoats

They started off their investigation, by feeding two groups of mice, a pretty standard Western diet. It was high in omega-6 fats and low in omega-3 fats.

• Group 1 were rather special, they have been hooked up with a gene from Caenorhabditis elegans, the fat-1 gene, which allows them to turn omega-6 fatty acids, into omega-3 fatty acids, as needed.
• Group 1 were just ordinary mice. As ordinary mice, the only omega-3s they had access to, came from the diet.

The mice all ate the same thing.

But, thanks to the genetic wizardry, the effect of this diet, on the animal’s biochemistry was a little different.

Fat-1 mice had more than enough omega-3, while the normal mice, were omega-3 deficient.

No bacteria, no problem

The research team found, when omega-3’s were in short supply, endotoxin levels were significantly higher.

As expected, when they killed off the gut bacteria, with an antibiotic, the problem corrected itself.

No bacteria, no endotoxin.

Living together, no problem

But, something interesting happened when they allowed fat-1 mice and ordinary mice to hang out together. The fat-1 mice were able to “SAVE” the ordinary mice from endotoxemia.

How did they do it ?

Before, I continue………………. I need to tell you something about mice living together. They don’t just cuddle, they eat each other’s poop.

I know GROSS.

But, this experiment, showed something in the poop, saved the day…

No omega-3, no housekeeping

A little digging revealed…………

The protector in the poop, was IAP, hotel colon’s housekeeping service.

This study, revealed omega-3, was responsible for despatching this house keeping enzyme. When omega-3 was low, house keeping just couldn’t keep up, with the overcoat shedding.

It’s a house keeping problem

This research suggests, low grade inflammation, happens because of a problem with house keeping.

But, it can be “fixed”.

The house keeping team of Hotel Colon, need omega-3 to get out and about cleaning.

Restoring the balance

The modern diet has the omega ratios ALL WRONG. We typically get too much omega 6 and not enough omega 3. The reason, we don’t eat enough fish (which in the wild, is loaded with omega-3) and eat too much margarine, corn and chicken.

Restoring the balance of omega-3 to omega-6, should help stop the low grade inflammation, which contributes to metabolic syndrome and leads to obesity.

How do you do it ?

Eat more fish and eat less vegetable oil.

If you can’t do this, consider an omega-3 supplement, just make sure it only contains omega-3 – buying a supplement with both, does nothing to fix the ratio.

Further reading