Microbiome - or bacteria in our gut and on our bodies
Great 90 minute video by ICU physician , Milton Mills, on “ Are Humans Designed to Eat Meat ?
https://www.drmcdougall.com/health/education/videos/free-electures/milton-mills-md/
This is an excellent lecture on why we are not carnivores and or even really omnivores. ( The information on animals is fascinating in itself. )
Examples: Carnivores like wolves can eat 30% of their body weight in one meal or approximately 21000 calories in one meal.
Carnivores stomach pH with food present is <1. That’s acidic enough to dissolve a penny. So they can eat things whole and bones.
The Microbiome is a new area of study . But we know now that the colon is not just for water absorption and storage of waste. This does not make sense teleologically - since matter in our GI tract spends 2/3 of its time in our large intestine. Approximate time is less than 3 hours in stomach, 2 hours in small intestine and 13 hours in large intestine.
Dr. Mills discusses how fiber in the colon in Vegans is acted upon by bacteria to be converted to short chain fatty acids.
Proprionate inhibits HMG CoA reductase like statins .
Another decreases liver production of glucose like Metformin. A third, Butyrate, is the preferred source of energy for the colon over sugar. This leads to a thicker mucous lining and closer cells so less material that is not wanted in the blood can get through. Leading to less inflammation which decreases the risk for CVD and cancers.
So a Vegan diet is not only good because it is low in saturated fats and no cholesterol, but because it changes our microbiome too.
In addition, phytoestrogens are produced and this leads to an increase liver production of SHBG which decreases the risk for breast cancer and prostate cancer.
Also new studies , which we will discuss later, show that the microbiome affects areas that we would not even think possible. Some are only in animals, but some are in humans. It is an area of great interest to me. So, one example would be where they transplanted the bacteria in calm dogs into aggressive dogs and the aggressive dogs became more calm. Also in obese patients they have shown that the microbiome stimulate the vagus nerve and this causes the brain to crave certain foods that are not good for us in these days of excess.

It is important to digress here for a moment. The Microbiome is one of the reasons why you don’t want to cheat on this diet to get the maximum benefits. If you eat animal products along with the WFPBD you will not get the changes in the microbiome that you want, since you will still be feeding the bad “animal related bacteria” . So you will get some benefits by not eating as much animal products with their higher saturated fats, cholesterol , etc than animal products. But you won’t get the benefits of some of the chemicals that would be made by the good vegan bacteria. An example would be not producing butyrate the preferred nutrition for the cells lining our intestine. Without this more stuff that is not supposed to get into our blood stream from the intestines will and that will increase our risks for and or exacerbate many diseases, especially the autoimmune diseases like Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, MS, Rheumatoid arthritis etc.