Do gut bacteria drive our behaviour? Yes. Do they drive our sexual behaviour? Now that’s a loaded question…
Yesterday on Twitter I reported on a new study that claims there is a clear association between sexual behaviour and the composition of the gut microbiome, that diverse and vital community of bacteria, yeasts and fungi that lives inside our digestive systems and, as we’re discovering, regulates our health and happiness in so many ways.
According to the new study, 70% of “men who have sex with men” have a distinctive community of bacteria called Segatella in their gut that is found in only 10% of the wider Western population.
What could this mean?
It’s very clear what the authors of the study think it means. If it has any significance at all, it’s as an effect of the sexual behaviour of “men who have sex with men.” By performing the distinctive sex acts which largely only they perform—although increasingly heterosexual sex is taking on a, how shall we say, backdoor focus—“men who have sex with men” acquire a distinctive cohort of bacteria in their gut. The authors note that this makes their gut biomes much more like those of non-industrial peoples.
It’s not like this should really be news to us. If you’ve read Randy Schilts’s fantastic book about the early days of the AIDS epidemic in the US, And the Band Played On, when AIDS was still referred to as GRIDS (gay-related immune-deficiency syndrome) or didn’t even have a name yet, you’ll know that unusual bacterial and parasitic infections were extremely common among sufferers and frequently noted by physicians. Gay men died of cryptosporidium infections, for instance, a parasite that is primarily associated with livestock. Nobody was or is supposed to die of cryptosporidium infections.