Role in Disease
Bacteria in the digestive tract have pathogenic properties in addition to their health-inducing ones: they can produce toxins and carcinogens and have been implicated in such conditions as multisystem organ failure, sepsis, colon cancer, and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). A major factor in health is the balance of bacterial numbers; if the numbers grow too high or low, it will result in harm to the host. The host has enzymes to regulate this balance.
Read more about this topic: Gut Flora
Famous quotes containing the words role and/or disease:
“Given that external reality is a fiction, the writer’s role is almost superfluous. He does not need to invent the fiction because it is already there.”
—J.G. (James Graham)
“For somehow this disease inheres in tyranny, never to trust one’s friends.”
—Aeschylus (525–456 B.C.)