By the age of three, a healthy child has a fully developed microbiome. A three-year-old with severe acute malnutrition, by contrast, has a microbiome similar to that of a healthy one-and-a-half-year-old
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskIn collaboration with Jeffrey Gordon and his colleagues at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, Dr Ahmed’s team have produced a new mixture for the treatment of malnutrition. Besides providing nutrients, this formulation also enhances gut health. That brings benefits to the malnourished which the conventional approach does not.
It thus looked likely that, while the underlying cause of kwashiorkor is unquestionably an insufficiency of nutrients, undernourished individuals who might otherwise remain free of its symptoms may be tipped over the edge by an unbalanced microbiome. Microbiomes are easily unbalanced. Following Caesarean births, for example, babies are not exposed to bacteria from their mothers in the way that they are during vaginal births. Such transfers help determine the early microbial population of a child’s gut—and a third of Bangladeshi children are born by Caesarean section, compared with around a quarter in rich Western countries.