The health care reform bill has passed and many people will be celebrating that, finally, the United States will work to assure every citizen health insurance that cannot be canceled because you change your job, because you get sick, or for any other reason.

Remember this is just a start to the transformation of health care. While all of the things I worked for with my colleagues Drs. Dean Ornish and Michael Roizen, on Capital hill the last year did not make it into the final bill, a few important things did and we can build on that. In fact, in my last meeting with Senator Harkin in December, he assured me that the passage of this bill would be just the beginning of reform and that after it passed we could move on to healthcare reform 2.0 that addresses more of the underlying issues about not only who is covered but what is covered.

Imagine all of the Federal buildings in Washington collapsing in less than a minute killing 30-40% of our government workforce, crippling the tax collection system leaving the government no money to pay salaries or overhead. Our government, which seems to barely work at full capacity with gleaming buildings and a gargantuan budget, would come to a halt.

This is the state of Haiti today. Arriving again in Haiti, five weeks after we first landed in the chaos of the first days after the earthquake, the tarmac of the airport was eerily quiet, almost deserted. Some things had changed. There were more tent camps, a few more latrines, less rubble in the roads, more mouths fed, less acute medical injuries and trauma, more tents instead of open air surgical wards at the University Hospital where we were the first surgical team after the quake. But the layers of trauma were more apparent. At the University Hospital, the entire second year nursing class was crushed and died in the nursing school. Teachers and nearly all the schools were destroyed. During the five o'clock hour of the quake all the priests and seminarians met in their churches. Most of the priests, the future priests and their churches are now gone. The Universities with most of their precious intellectual capital of professors and the best and the brightest of Haiti are gone.

Your digestive system may be making you fat. It’s hard to believe – but very true!

Today, I’m going to explain how the bugs in your digestive tract and the way they upset your gut’s immune system just might be behind those extra pounds.

I have observed this phenomenon in hundreds of patients. Recently, remarkable new research has confirmed this phenomenon. I have developed very effective treatments for it, based on understanding the way in which all the body’s systems – the gut, the immune system, detoxification system, hormones and more – are connected.

There’s powerful evidence that addressing these key causes of weight gain and illness can help you shed pounds.

For example, I’ve seen patients who lose significant amounts of weight, just by cutting food allergens from their diet. And I have also seen people lose 20 to 30 pounds, simply by balancing the bacterial ecosystem in their intestinal system.

One patient, a 38-year-old woman, had chronic inflammation, fluid retention, acne, fatigue, and joint pain, as well as irritable bowel syndrome with bloating and gas. She had tried every known diet, but was unable to lose weight.

This woman’s problem: She could not lose weight because she was inflamed. Imbalances in her gut and the food sensitivities that result led to the inflammation.

But when we had her eliminate the foods to which she was allergic or sensitive, and gave her some healthy bacteria to heal her gut, she lost 35 pounds in a few months – and all her other symptoms went away too.

The big debate in medicine is which comes first: inflammation or obesity. I have always believed that we become inflamed first, and gain weight second – which makes us even more inflamed, perpetuating the cycle. Now incredible new research bears this out.

In today’s blog I want to review this research, explain how food allergies can lead to weight gain, and provide you with three steps you can take to eliminate foods you may be allergic to and rebalance the ecosystem in your gut.