You are What You Eat

In the last 20 years or so the discovery has been made that gut health directly effects mental health, i.e. autism, depression, stress, aggression can all be treated by changing diet or correcting our microbiome or gut bacteria. Antibiotics can destroy our gut bacteria and make us mentally ill as a result. Children born with a caesarian may have worse mental health due to less complex gut bacteria. Modern high fat, high sugar processed diets disturb our gut bacteria creating mental illness as our gut bacteria is like a second brain, creating chemicals which adjust moods. These chemicals, lately supplied by doctors, psychiatrists cause negative side effects but when supplied through a healthy digestive tract make us physically and psychologically healthy. Current political crises sweeping the world could well be attributable to bad diets in subject populations becoming depressive or aggressive due to junk foods or food desserts. A mediterranean diet full of fresh produce, oils, nuts is ideal for mental as well as physical health. As the decline of Rome is oft times attributed to lead drinking bowls and water pipes, a major contributor to the decline of the West will most certainly be attributed by historians to mental deficiencies due to improper dietary habits due to improper agricultural subsidies and lifestyles of convenience.