Western Diet Blamed For Global Spread Of Autoimmune Disease

More and more people around the world are suffering because their immune systems can no longer tell the difference between healthy cells and invading micro-organisms. Disease defenses that once protected them are instead attacking their tissue and organs, Robin McKie, Observer science editor reported.

Photo Insert: Fast-food diets lack certain important ingredients, such as fiber, and evidence suggests this alteration affects a person’s microbiome – the collection of micro-organisms that we have in our gut and which play a key role in controlling various bodily functions.

Major international research efforts are being made to fight this trend – including an initiative at London’s Francis Crick Institute, where two world experts, James Lee and Carola Vinuesa, have set up separate research groups to help pinpoint the precise causes of autoimmune disease, as these conditions are known. “Numbers of autoimmune cases began to increase about 40 years ago in the west,” Lee told the Observer.

“However, we are now seeing some emerge in countries that never had such diseases before. For example, the biggest recent increase in inflammatory bowel disease cases has been in the Middle East and East Asia. Before that, they had hardly seen the disease.”

Autoimmune diseases range from type 1 diabetes to rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, and multiple sclerosis. In each case, the immune system gets its wires crossed and turns on healthy tissue instead of infectious agents.

In the UK alone, at least 4 million people have developed such conditions, with some individuals suffering more than one. Internationally, it is now estimated that cases of autoimmune diseases are rising by between 3% and 9% a year.

Most scientists believe environmental factors play a key role in this rise. “Human genetics hasn’t altered over the past few decades,” said Lee, who was previously based at Cambridge University. “So something must be changing in the outside world in a way that is increasing our predisposition to autoimmune disease.”

This idea was backed by Vinuesa, who was previously based at the Australian National University. She pointed to changes in diet that were occurring as more and more countries adopted western-style diets and people bought more fast food.

“Fast-food diets lack certain important ingredients, such as fiber, and evidence suggests this alteration affects a person’s microbiome – the collection of micro-organisms that we have in our gut and which play a key role in controlling various bodily functions,” Vinuesa said.

“These changes in our microbiomes are then triggering autoimmune diseases, of which more than 100 types have now been discovered.” Both scientists stressed that individual susceptibilities were involved in contracting such illnesses, ailments that also include celiac disease as well as lupus, which triggers inflammation and swelling and can cause damage to various organs, including the heart.

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