Joining Pat to discuss the auto-immune disease ‘Gastritis’ is Dr Luke O’Neill.
American entrepreneur and 'tech bro' Bryan Johnson has previously stated his hopes to live well beyond 100 and has worked towards this goal through 'bio-hacking'.
Mr Johnson made his fortune after his company, Braintree, was bought by eBay.
The entrepreneur has spent millions to try to reverse his biological age, and had a documentary on Netflix, mapping out his journey.
Johnson spent $2 million a year on this, with all these regimens and treatments to cure the incurable auto-immune disease gastritis.
The disease, which affects approximately 0.5% of the world population, is not life-threatening.
“The main problem is your immune system begins to attack a cell in your stomach”, Professor Luke O’Neill told The Pat Kenny Show.
“The cells, called parietal cells, are needed to get Vitamin B12 absorbed into the body.
“The first thing it often presents is B12 deficiency, and that gives rise to anemia.You can take vitamin B12 to treat that. The second one is iron - you can't absorb iron as much.
“They took samples from his stomach and they spotted the autoimmune thing going on which helped diagnose him.”
A PhD student tests blood samples. Picture by: JUAN MABROMATA/AFP via Getty Images.Professor O’Neill warned that a small share of these inflammations can turn into cancer which can only be avoided through regular endoscopies.
Bryan Johnson, described by some as a ‘bio-hacker’ - someone using their own biology to achieve something by taking supplements, changing your diet, exercising for example.
Other ways to biohack can be done through sleep or even usage of one’s own stem cells.
“[Johnson] is going to be map his whole immune system because it's an immune disease”, he told Newstalk.
“The next step is he's going to grow his own immune cells in a dish. It's called Bryan Johnson in a dish. He's going to test things on those cells and see if he can manipulate them with drugs and so on.”
Prof. O’Neill said he was not completely averse to Johnson's efforts through bio-hacking.
Main Image: Luke O'Neill on Newstalk.
