Gut health for Channel 4

It’s not the smell of love that is in the air on Channel 4 tonight, instead its the smell of poo…

It’s time to lift the lid on our gutsy insides and smash the poo taboo. Gut health is, Channel 4 state, ‘one of the most exciting new frontiers in science, and our poo holds surprising clues to our mental and physical wellbeing’.

So, with that in mind, the broadcaster is throwing open the doors to Poo HQ: a myth-busting, attitude-shifting clinic where no poo problem is off limits, as we see real people with a variety of different issues candidly open up to a team of gut experts in the hope that they can get to the bottom of things.

This episode focuses on how the gut is a key part of our immune system.

The programme meets a salesman who wants to know if his psoriasis could be linked to his gut health and a businesswoman with multiple allergies and bowel issues. Plus, a woman with an embarrassing wind problem is getting in the way of her love of pole dancing. Can dietitian Sophie Medlin, gut expert Dr Rabia Topan and immunologist Dr Jenna Macciochi unpack their problems, and set them on a journey to physical and emotional improvement?

Meanwhile, twin presenters Alana Macfarlane Kempner and Lisa Macfarlane find out if how the way a baby is born and fed could affect their microbes, and they also meet immunologist Professor Danny Altman, who’s studying the relationship between gut health and long Covid.

Inside Our Guts, Channel 4, 8pm