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Statin drugs might boost healthy gut microbes

An analysis of faecal samples reveals that obese people who take cholesterol-lowering statin drugs have a ‘healthier’ community of gut microorganisms than would be expected. What are the implications of this surprising finding?
  1. Peter Libby

    1. Peter Libby is in the Department of Medicine, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.

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Our digestive systems harbour more bacterial cells than there are human cells in our bodies. Although the often-mentioned estimate of a tenfold excess of microorganisms over human cells might exaggerate the ratio1, even conservative estimates2 accord the microbes numerical dominance at a ratio of about 1.3:1. These close gut microbial neighbours of ours comprise around 0.3% of a person’s mass2, and there are more than 100 times more bacterial genes in the gut3 than there are genes in their human host. Interest has burgeoned in the potential effects of these normal gut residents (sometimes termed commensal bacteria) on our well-being. Writing in Nature, Vieira-Silva et al.4 report an unexpected discovery, regarding patterns of gut microbes, that might have clinical consequences.

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Nature 581, 263-264 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-01281-0

Updates & Corrections

  • Update 16 July 2020: This article has been updated with additional information about the author’s competing interests.

References

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Competing Interests

The author has a financial interest in Xbiotech, a company developing therapeutic human antibodies. The author's interests were reviewed and are managed by Brigham and Women's Hospital and Partners HealthCare in accordance with their conflict of interest policies. The author is also an unpaid consultant to, or involved in clinical trials for, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Esperion Therapeutics, Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Kowa Pharmaceuticals, Novartis, Pfizer, Sanofi-Regeneron and XBiotech. He is a member of scientific advisory boards for Amgen, Corvidia Therapeutics, DalCor Pharmaceuticals, Kowa Pharmaceuticals, Olatec Therapeutics, Medimmune, Novartis and XBiotech. He serves on the board of XBiotech. His laboratory has received research funding in the past two years from Novartis.

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