There are non-communicable diseases that, after all, can be transmitted (including cancer)

The research found that people who live closely together share much of their gut microbiome and gave new life to the hypothesis that non-communicable diseases such as cancer or heart disease may be communicable after all.

A new study published in Nature came to a conclusion that promises to change Medicine — there are diseases that until now were thought to be intransmissible and that, after all, can be contagious.

The research analyzed the bacteria in the saliva and feces of 4840 people and information about the host, which made it possible to assess the possible transmission of bacteria between mothers and children up to three years of age and between other family members. or close people. The sample was also diverse, including volunteers from 20 countries.

The conclusions even show that there are “hopping” bacteria that transmit diseases between close people. In the cases of mothers with young children, the two share 34% of bacterial strains of the intestine, reports the CNN Portugal.

Two people who live in the same house share 12% of their gut microbiome while two adult twins who live separately share only 8% — the same percentage as any other people who live together daily, whether they are known or not.

Research suggests that transmission took place largely horizontally and “was intensified by the duration of cohabitation”, but the authors do not reject the option of fecal transmission due to poor hand hygiene.

This study thus gives new impetus to the theory that there are diseases that apparently are not transmissible, but which, after all, can be. This hypothesis was already addressed in a 2020 study in which microbiologist Brett Finlay criticized the fact that the definition of non-communicable diseases — which includes cancercardiovascular disease, and respiratory disease—not to include microbial involvement, which is now known to be easily transmissible from person to person.