We are constantly being told that our weight is simply a result of over eating and under exercising. “Eat less and exercise more” it’s good advice but recent research supports the idea that it is not always so simple.

Dr. Jeffrey I. Gordon and a team of scientists at Washington University has discovered that obese people may get more calories from food than lean people do because they have a different mix of bacteria in their intestines.

The studies show that obesity maybe linked to the makeup of bacterial communities inside our intestines. Apparently about 90 percent of the bacteria in the colon fall into two major groups, or divisions, called the Bacteroidetes and the Firmicutes. The Firmicutes extract more calories from food than the Bacteroidetes do. And animal studies demonstrated that the Firmicutes can induce weight gain in mice.

However there are problems with the conclusions, which form a bit of a chicken and egg syndrome. What comes first the bacteria or the digestive conditions that support the bacteria?

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has long promoted the idea that weight gain is the result of a failure of normal digestive function. According to TCM principles food and water are transformed by the actions of the Zang Fu (organs) to produce Gu Qi a pure form of energy for use within the body. When this digestive process fails it leads to the production of Damp. Damp is a mist like substance that has no functional benefit in the body and can accumulate and transform or thicken into Phlegm. The damp and phlegm then cause accumulations and blockages in the body that can lead to many problem including weight gain, arterial plaques, tumours, cysts and joint dysfunction.

The main Zang Fu responsible for good digestion are the Pi (Spleen) and Wei (Stomach). Together they form a Yin-Yang pair and operate in a delicate balance of conditions. Each is opposite in its requirements to the other. For example the Stomach is Yang while the Spleen is Yin. Stomach energy descends while Spleen energy rises. The Stomach likes wetness and dislikes dryness while the Spleen likes dryness and dislikes wetness.

Digestion is seen as a process of rotting and ripening the food in the stomach while the Spleen does the transforming and transporting it as Qi into the body. If the Stomach is too dry the food will not breakdown properly. While if the Spleen becomes too damp it cannot transform the food properly. This balance has to be right or the end result is the production of Damp. For those that are unfamiliar with the idea of digestion in TCM it is important that you realize that the transforming function of the Spleen occurs through out the body is not just limited to inside the abdomen.

One of the most significant causes of poor digestion is simply over eating or eating too much of the wrong type of foods. This impedes the Stomach function or floods the Spleen with cold and damp. It’s a bit like putting too much fuel on a fire and suffocating it.

Since the Spleen dislikes Damp, poor digestion, which produces Damp leads to a vicious cycle it increases the tendency to continue to accumulate Damp. This seems to fit with the observations of the researchers that found as weight went up more Firmicutes are present. While the numbers of Firmicutes decreased, as the intake of food was restricted and the transformation capacity of the Spleen was given a chance to start clearing the accumulated damp.

In the research they tried to determine which came first: the fat, or the bacteria. To find out, the lab took mice that had never been exposed to any bacteria, so their intestines were germ-free. Half of them got bacteria taken from skinny mice. The other half got bacteria from fat mice. Both groups put on body fat. But the mice that received bacteria from obese donors gained more fat over the course of the experiment.

The problem with this is that the mice digestion may well be abnormal, as it is well known that gut bacteria play an important part in a healthy digestion. However it does seem that the Firmicutes have a dampening effect on the digestion that is greater than the Bacteroidetes do.

It would appear from the reports that the Firmicutes are opportunistic and survive more easily in an already damp overloaded system than Bacteroidetes, which were able to multiply in the gut as the damp was eliminated.

While there maybe some merit in the idea, the obesity epidemic may be due to shifts in the types of microbes that live inside us. And our modern lifestyles, especially antibiotic use, maybe adding to the epidemic of obesity. I believe that it is more likely that the bacteria are there because the digestion is poor and the conditions are right for the bacteria.