Sometimes bacteria lurking in people's guts can get them drunk, even if they don't consume any alcohol.
Imagine you're a police officer. You spot a car that's swerving all over the road. You pull the driver over and they're clearly intoxicated. With slurred speech, they swear that they haven't had a drop of alcohol all day. Would you believe them?
I am a microbiologist who is intrigued by the roles the gut microbiome plays in human health. As the author of the book"Pleased to Meet Me: Genes, Germs, and the Curious Forces That Make Us Who We Are," I have done extensive research into how your microbiome affects your health, mood and behavior. It turns out the specific species of bacteria in your intestines at the root of auto-brewery syndrome may also cause fatty liver disease by producing high levels of alcohol.
In a 2019 study, physicians identified a patient who was suffering from both auto-brewery syndrome and severe MASLD. When researchers examined stool samples from the patient, they found a species of bacteria called Klebsiella pneumoniae. This particular strain of K. pneumoniae was making between four and six times the quantity of alcohol that strains of the same bacteria make in healthy people.
A microbrewery in the gutTo understand whether microbes were really to blame for fatty liver, the scientists fed the high-alcohol-producing K. pneumoniae bacteria to healthy mice. Within one month, these mice developed measurable symptoms of fatty liver, which progressed to cirrhosis within two months. The bacteria-triggered liver disease followed the same timeline the researchers observed when they fed the mice pure alcohol.
RELATED STORIES—A man kept getting drunk without using alcohol. It turns out, his gut brews its own booze.—A woman's bladder 'brewed' its own alcohol, tripping drug test It isn't clear whether this phenomenon is widespread. Klebsiella bacteria is commonly found in human intestines, but it is unknown why some people harbor strains that make high levels of alcohol.
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