The Gut Alarm

New research shows how unhealthy food and lifestyle habits have damaged Indian guts, causing a raft of serious physical and mental ailments

- SONALI ACHARJEE

Thirty-year-old Delhi resident Sangeeta Karmakar had IBS or irritable bowel syndrome for 10 years. From constipation to bloating to extreme flatulence, and sometimes indigestion, she had to live with it all. She had constant pain in the abdomen; sometimes the pain would spread to her legs, head and back and get so bad that she would not be able to sleep on her side.

There is a strong relationship between gut health and sleep, she says. Those with poor gut health cannot sleep, and I had to be put on sleeping pills. Recent research corroborates Karmakar's lived experience. In our naïve, rough and ready understanding of human biology, we believe our memory comes from our brains, our hunger from our stomachs and our sleep and mood are governed by the external environment. But what if you were told that each one of these responses originates in the human gut, where a thriving colony of bacteria, archaea (a class of micro-organisms) and eukarya (organisms whose cells have a nucleus) is doing more than just help you digest food, absorb nutrients and excrete faecal waste? Numbering in their trillions and estimated to be more numerous than human cells, these residents of the gastrointestinal tract are collectively known as the 'human microbiota', and their well-being is crucial to the overall health of the human body.