How Soil Health Is Reflected in the Gut

“We’ve wiped out 40 percent of biology on earth in just fifty years,” says Zach Bush, MD. “And yet that Mother Earth keeps reaching out saying: Are you sure you don't want to keep playing? Because we could have some fun together.” For Bush, the health of our soil microbiome is the single most potent factor determining how healthy—or unhealthy—we are. What makes Bush’s case particularly compelling is the unlikely path he took to realizing it: Bush is a board-certified physician with a background in internal medicine, endocrinology and metabolism, and hospice and palliative care. He thought he’d spend his whole life in academia, until a curveball took him to a nutrition center in rural Virginia. There, everything Bush “knew” about nutrition and the drivers of disease and medicine...broke. Slowly, he began to put together the pieces, which told a new story that felt both surprising and intuitive to him. Today, Bush shares that story, along with the steps we can take to move from chemical farming toward regenerative agriculture, and from a culture of dis-ease toward one of healing.” (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.)