Gut: The inside story of our body’s most under-rated organ

On a short subchapter on Probiotics, the author wrote that “People have been eating probiotic bacteria since time memorial. Without them, we would not exist. A group of South Americans had to learn this through bitter experience: they had the clever idea of taking pregnant women to the South Pole to have then babies. The plan was that the babies born there could stake a claim to any oil future reserves, as ‘natives' of the region. But the babies did not survive. They died soon after birth, or on the way back to South America. The South Pole is so cold and germ-free that the infants simply did not receive the bacteria they needed so survive. The normal temperatures and bacteria the babies encountered after leaving the Antarctic were enough to kill them.”

That's interesting, I thought, and immediately had to read up on this. I have to admit that I can find nothing about babies not surviving after Antarctic births. I am not sure that this is a fact. A look on the www has come up with nothing concerning this other than there have been at least 11 births and I can find nothing to show that they all died. Emilio Marcos Des Palma Morella, the first documented human born on the Antarctic mainland in 1978 is still alive from what I can ascertain.

If I am going to question this book, I might add a couple of other things I have struggled with, and that is the line drawings that are pointless and childlike and a lack of index.

Other than that, this is, to be fair, a good read that has enhanced my understanding of our gut. After reading a book on ultra processed food, I am even more determined that I will treat my stomach and all the other gut organs with the respect it deserves. My copy is the first print run, so I read that some of the information has been updated (babies born in the Antarctic?) in later editions. The author makes it clear that a lot of what is discussed is in its infancy, so that is understandable.

As far a popular pop style science goes, there is a lot going for this very easy to read book for anyone such as myself who is not that good at taking the sciences of any type into their brain due to it all being very complex. Simple explanations such as this book provides are ideal.