Digestion Basics

The Ecosystem in the Digestive Tract

Inside the digestive tube is a vast ecosystem where some 100 trillion bacteria live. This should not alarm you. We have been conditioned to think of bacteria as something bad, and the thought that we have 100 trillion "bugs" inhabiting our body can make us feel slightly queasy. Although some bacteria are bad, others are very good. In fact, if you don't have them you feel very bad, because they are critical for proper digestion.

These bacteria have several important jobs: they help to break down food, they actually create some vitamins, they work directly with the immune system surrounding the digestive tract to protect us, and they independently protect us against invading organisms. Our relationship with the 100 trillion bacteria in our digestive tract has developed over hundreds of thousands of years. There should be no doubt about the importance of this ecosystem to good health.