Ethanol, Acetaldehyde and Gastrointestinal Flora

I found a research paper with the same title as this post. You can view it (PDF) here.

It suggests that colonic bacteria have a significant role in ethanol elimination (they produce the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase which converts ethanol to acetaldehyde). This is possibly why you can't drink as much when you modify your gut microflora (e.g. by eliminating carbohydrates or taking antibiotics).

Coeliac Disease is often triggered by infections

PMID 17637949 Clinical onset of celiac disease after an episode of Campylobacter jejuni enteritis. Verdu et al, Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology, July 2007.
PMID 20190752 Multiple common variants for celiac disease influencing immune gene expression. Dubois et al, Nature Genetics, February 2010.
PMID 19628216 Altered fecal microflora and increased fecal calprotectin in infants with colic. Rhoads et al., Journal of Pediatrics, December 2009.

All these papers suggest coeliac disease can be triggered by infections - C. jejuni, various viruses, and Klebsiella.

Animal fats do not cause heart disease.

PMID 20071648 Meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies evaluating the association of saturated fat with cardiovascular disease. (Siri-Tarino et al. Amercican Journal of Clinical Nutrition, March 2010)

This very recent meta-analysis shows that there is "no significant evidence for concluding that dietary saturated fat is associated with an increased risk of CHD or CVD".

This analysis includes a large number of subjects (347,747), and from 5-23 years of follow-up.

Similar results come out of several large studies - for example the Swedish "Malmö Diet and Cancer Study" (PMID 16018792 - Journal of Internal Medicine, August 2005). The authors conclude: 

"With the exception of cancer mortality for women in the highest quartile of relative fat intake, individuals receiving more than 30% of their total daily energy from fat did not have increased mortality. Men in the fourth quartile of total fat intake, receiving almost 50% of their total energy intake from fat, had the lowest cardiovascular mortality. Receiving more than 10% of total energy intake from saturated fat did not have a significant effect on all-cause, cardiovascular or cancer mortality for men or women. Beneficial effects of relatively high intakes of unsaturated fats were not uniform, and having a high index of unsaturated fat compared with saturated fat intake did not have any detectable effect on mortality."

Heavy Drinkers should take Vitamin C (and B1)

PMID 1171591 - Protective action of ascorbic acid and sulfur compounds against acetaldehyde toxicity: implications in alcoholism and smoking. (Sprince et al. 1975)

Acetaldehyde is the agent that causes hangovers and liver damage in heavy drinkers. Rats were fed acetaldehyde at a dose that would kill 90% of them (LD90). Various compounds were tested to see if they would protect against death. It was found that a combination of vitamin C (l-ascorbic acid), vitamin B1 (thiamine) and L-cysteine (an amino acid) gave 'virtually complete protection'. These compounds were given at 2.0, 1.0 and 0.3 mmol/kg respectively. For fun, let's scale this up to a standard-size and a large human male :)

Compound	Molecular wt.	Rat(mmol/kg)	70kg man (grams)	100kg man (grams)
Vitamin C	176.12	2.0	24.7	35.2
L-cysteine	121.16	1.0	8.5	12.1
Vitamin B1	337.27	0.3	7.1	10.1

This is a huge amount of powder to take before you go out 'on the razzle'! That much vitamin C in one dose will give you explosive diarrhoea within half an hour, so "don't try this at home"! (how did it affect the rats??) Vitamin B1 is non-toxic (oral mouse LD50 is 8 grams/kg) and hypervitaminosis B1 is unknown. L-cysteine is hard to get in the UK as powder. Most places selling powdered amino acids stock N-acetyl cysteine instead. However, you make be able to get some shipped from America from purebulk.com.

Supplemental Vitamin C helps - but getting it from food is worthless!

PMID 15585762 - Antioxidant vitamins and coronary heart disease risk: a pooled analysis of 9 cohorts.

This study was published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2004 and concludes: "Dietary intake of antioxidant vitamins was only weakly related to a reduced CHD risk" but also "The results suggest a reduced incidence of major CHD events at high supplemental vitamin C intakes."

The risk reductions for vitamin E and carotinoids were small.

Old People should take vitamin C!

PMID 14594788 
Antioxidant vitamins and mortality in older persons: findings from the nutrition add-on study to the Medical Research Council Trial of Assessment and Management of Older People in the Community. (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2003)

Conclusion: Low blood vitamin C concentrations in the older British population are strongly predictive of mortality. 

Therefore I suggest that you are insane if you are old and do not take a large dose of vitamin C daily, since it is a totally harmless compound when taken in divided doses throughout the day.

HOWEVER, the fact that a low blood concentration of X predicts mortality does not necessarily mean that artificially adjusting the concentration will reduce mortality. Retaining all hair into your fifties rather than going bald when you are young is predictive of prostate cancer but getting laser hair removal on your scalp is not going to help. In the same way, low blood concentrations of vitamin C may simply be indicative of another more serious problem.