Obese Microbiome May Be Real Cause of “Wear and Tear” Arthritis

The arthritis and joint pain that afflicts obese people may not be due to overstressed joints, as is often assumed. Instead, the real cause of obesity-associated joint overload may be inflammation—body-wide inflammation driven by the microbes that thrive in the guts of obese people.An even more fundamental cause may be an unbalanced diet, one so rich in fats that it unbalances the gut microbiome. Yet a high-fat diet’s joint-degrading effects may be lessened if a prebiotic supplement