Dr Graham Lloyd-Jones

They used the C word ...

Q: What CAUSES insulin resistance?

A: The toxic enzymes of gum disease bacteria.

(Note: Other mechanisms of insulin resistance involving the biological actions of dysbiotic oral bacteria are available.)

The mouth is an immune organ.
Gum disease is an open wound.
Ignoring gum disease and the bacteria which inhabit inflammed gums means ignoring the driver of multiple systemic diseases.
#OralHealth matters!
5/5

Gum disease is not just a local problem for the mouth - it’s a central hub of systemic disease. And what goes around comes around.
It is not just a bidirectional (two-way) process. Multiple systemic diseases are the same as gum disease, just in different parts of the body.
4/5

The bacteria of #GumDisease / #OralDysbiosis don’t just travel - they subvert our immune system, fuel systemic inflammation, and contribute to cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, autoimmunity, gut diseases, lung diseases, cancers, and pregnancy complications ...
3/5

Chronic gum inflammation and #OralDysbiosis go hand in hand, leading to inflammatory bacteria repeatedly seeding the gut, lungs, and body organs via the bloodstream (our blood vessels, brain, pancreas, liver, joints, kidneys, placenta etc.) ...
2/5

We obsess about probiotics and food for gut health, but ignore the harmful ecosystem we are actively cultivating in our own mouths ...
1/5

Not as much as there should have been.
Do you have something in mind?
Or a question?

True.
Just saying, to study the gut microbiome without also studying the oral microbiome is like studying the tubes of a trombone without its mouthpiece and wondering where the music comes from.
The oral microbiome determines the gut microbiome.
And the oral microbiome translocates systemically.

Inflammation-type dysbiosis of the oral microbiome associates with the duration of COVID-19 symptoms and long COVID In the COVID-19 pandemic, caused by SARS-CoV-2, many individuals experience prolonged symptoms, termed long-lasting COVID-19 symptoms (long COVID). Long COVID is thought to be linked to immune dysregu...

Hi David.

Correct!

But the gut microbiome is downstream from …

The oral microbiome.

See this study from 2021
👇
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

And remember …
👇
Oral pathobionts have direct systemic vascular entry (bypassing the liver) via oral mucosa/diseased gums.

Published today after 2years of work behind the scenes by us at WHN/DELPHI Executive team : Our Global Expert DELPHI Consensus document on Long Covid. 179 Experts from 28 countries around the Globe Participated. Please share. Happy Easter!

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Dear #MedBlueSky

Black and white EITHER/OR debates limit us.

Nuanced AND/BOTH debates provide answers.

Let's not oversimplify the human body. It is too complicated to be understood in terms of binary EITHER/OR stances.

The nuance of AND/BOTH is the way forward.

Thanks

… to ensure correct language is used to describe a disease (not old and potentially misleading language)

And …

To allow challenges to incorrect concepts, to stop them propagating and becoming fixed dogma in the medical literature.

25/25

I'm now working with likeminded radiologists on an invited review of #COVID imaging for a major radiology journal.

We propose formation of a system by which all medical/scientific specialties collaborate to build understanding when we encounter a new disease …

24/25

My frustration with the world of medicine (my world) is that we are pathologically unable/unwilling to shift ideas or to see the body holistically.

Our blinkered and siloed approach kills people!

Oral health is the most siloed of all areas of medicine.

23/25

In summary, gum disease bacteria escape the mouth all the time and are directly implicated in biological mechanisms of numerous common diseases of the body including cardiovascular disease, diabetes,

22/25

YouTube video by Salisbury District Hospital COVID-19 and the Salisbury Oral Care Pathway

What have I learned from COVID-19? …

That our lack of understanding of the biology of the mouth and the importance of #OralHealth is the biggest missing link in the whole of medicine.

youtu.be/yLhtBZIaAIk
21/25

The concept of pathogens escaping the mouth and travelling to the rest of the body is now my major area of interest (writing a book).

20/25

This question led to hypothesizing that the virus is getting to the lungs from the upper respiratory tract (nose and mouth) via the bloodstream.

And this explains why gum disease is a major risk factor for death from COVID-19.

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

19/25

The pattern of lung disease we saw on medical imaging in people with #COVID-19 tells us that the disease is NOT pneumonia, it is a vasculopathy (disease of blood vessels).

This raises another question …

How does this happen?
18/25

You might think that medical organisations asked – what are we dealing with?

They didn’t!

They assumed it was just like influenza. They kept calling the disease ‘pneumonia’.

This was a fatal error.
17/25

At the outset of the pandemic, ‘experts’ were called on to advise on population level planning.
This is fine (if you like graphs), but we also need a multidisciplinary approach to attempt to understand the biological mechanisms of the disease we are dealing with.

16/25

Not ...
What old language can we use to describe this disease?

But ...
What is different?

What is new?

What don't we understand?

And ...
How can we collaborate to build a multidisciplinary understanding of diseases processes?

15/25

I am posting this story now so that we (humans) can learn some lessons.

When we encounter a new disease, we should all stop and ask ....

What are we dealing with?

Not ...
How is this similar to other diseases we know about?

14/25

Here is our conclusion …

(Remember, this is 2020 data which could have been published in early 2021)

13/25

After many attempts to get published we were eventually accepted this month (April 2025!) in an institutional journal.

(Thanks to @UMJBelfast. And thanks especially to my colleague Alastair Watson for not giving up hope of publication.)

bit.ly/4j6fIpx

12/25

The airways of the lungs were NORMAL!
Unlike influenza, there was no inflammation in the lung airways in people with #COVID-19.

The blood vessels were damaged.

And yet the world of medicine carried on treating it as if it were flu.

11/25

This led to an invitation to join the REACT COVID-19 research group based in Southampton, UK. I was initially the sole radiologist on the project.

People from across the world sent me examples of COVID-19 cases. I looked at thousands of images. The same pattern was repeated …

10/25

YouTube video by Radiology Masterclass COVID-19 Lung Disease: A Pulmonary Vasculopathy

In November 2020 I was invited to speak at the @BritSocHaem annual conference.

The talk highlights that #COVID-19 is NOT a pneumonia. It is a pulmonary vasculopathy (disease of the lung blood vessels).

youtu.be/2jROYLwUK20
9/25

So I published informally as a blog on the Radiology Masterclass website and shared my ideas widely.

bit.ly/3E6PX9D

8/25

In June 2020 I wrote to a UK radiology journal to raise the alert.

The title of my letter was – ‘Acute COVID-19 lung disease: A pulmonary vasculopathy not a pneumonia’

I was told it would be too ‘time-consuming’ to be put forward for publication.

7/25