{"id":751651,"date":"2026-07-09T02:06:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T02:06:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/751651\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T02:06:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T02:06:16","slug":"bryan-johnsons-diagnosis-shines-light-on-hard-to-detect-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/751651\/","title":{"rendered":"Bryan Johnson’s diagnosis shines light on hard-to-detect disease"},"content":{"rendered":"

Longevity entrepreneur Bryan Johnson shared some bad news on social media recently. \u201cI have an autoimmune disease. My stomach is eating itself,\u201d he wrote on X<\/a>. The good news? \u201cI\u2019m going to try and solve it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The disease in question is autoimmune gastritis, a chronic inflammatory condition in which antibodies destroy acid-producing cells in the stomach, which prevents people from absorbing iron. It\u2019s not in itself a fatal disease, but it is linked to an increased risk of stomach cancer and, eventually, to deficiencies in vitamin B12, which in turn causes anemia and neurological complications.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Autoimmune gastritis affects an estimated 4% of people worldwide<\/a>, but it may be more common than we know: Experts say the disease is notoriously difficult to diagnose, and that gastroenterologists often fail to recognize it in patients. Now it\u2019s in the spotlight thanks to Johnson, an unexpected spokesperson for any kind of disease, given the extreme measures he takes to protect and maintain his health. A 48-year-old multimillionaire biohacker whose Blueprint startup sells supplements, red-light laser therapy baseball caps<\/a> to reverse hair loss, and other longevity-related wares, he\u2019s also the founder of what he describes as a religion<\/a> called Don\u2019t Die. In recent years, Johnson has accumulated millions of social-media followers and grabbed national headlines with his longevity efforts, at one point getting blood plasma transfusions<\/a> from his teenage son.<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s announcement is a reminder that no matter how much anyone strives to optimize their health, \u201cyou really can\u2019t biohack your way completely out of disease or death,\u201d said Jennifer Dowd, a professor of demography and population health at the University of Oxford.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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It may also be an opportunity to raise awareness about the importance of performing biopsies to diagnose an often-overlooked and hard-to-treat chronic disease, said Toby Cornish, a gastrointestinal pathologist and professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think gastroenterologists should really be sampling more \u2018normal\u2019-appearing stomachs in patients with a history of iron deficiency that\u2019s been treated,\u201d Cornish said, \u201cbecause many of those patients will actually turn out to have autoimmune gastritis.\u201d<\/p>\n

What causes autoimmune gastritis?<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s post explaining autoimmune gastritis is a pretty good explanation of the disease, according to Cornish. He and other experts do say there\u2019s no specific research to support Johnson\u2019s suggestion that there may be a link between his childhood diet of fast food, sugary cereals, and sodas, and later a 40-pound weight gain, and the condition.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would call that highly speculative,\u201d Cornish said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The specific cause of autoimmune gastritis isn\u2019t known, but may be some combination of genetic factors, environmental triggers, and chronic inflammation, Mimi Chang Tan, an assistant professor of gastroenterology at Baylor College of Medicine, said via email. It is true that people with autoimmune thyroid disease, like Johnson, are more likely to be diagnosed with autoimmune gastritis, though one doesn\u2019t cause the other.\u00a0<\/p>\n

How is autoimmune gastritis diagnosed?<\/p>\n

For Johnson, the earliest symptom was his consistently low levels of ferritin \u2014 a blood protein that\u2019s measured to show how the body is storing iron. But blood tests showed that his levels of hemoglobin and hematocrit, which are used to diagnose anemia, were fine. So the problem was easy to dismiss.<\/p>\n

Autoimmune gastritis \u201cis notoriously insidious and frequently remains silent for decades, with symptoms often presenting outside of the gastrointestinal tract as fatigue, weakness, or neurological issues,\u201d said Tan. Ferritin levels like Johnson\u2019s are often an early sign, but a definitive diagnosis requires an upper endoscopy with biopsies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAnyone with low ferritin levels or iron deficiency anemia warrants an upper endoscopy and colonoscopy to screen not only for AIG but other causes of anemia,\u201d such as colorectal cancer, colon polyps, and a Helicobacter pylori stomach infection, said Tan. She notes that the latter three conditions are all more common than autoimmune gastritis.<\/p>\n

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One noteworthy tidbit from Johnson\u2019s post is the context he provides around the colonoscopy he received while searching for answers: \u201cI was 48 years old and overdue.\u201d The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends people start getting colonoscopies at age 45. Why would Johnson \u2014 who\u2019s called himself<\/a> \u201cthe most biologically measured person ever\u201d and spent $2 million<\/a> on medical treatments in 2023 alone \u2014 be late for a routine screening?<\/p>\n

Johnson didn\u2019t respond to a request for comment. But Cornish noted that it was only recently, back in 2021, that guidelines lowered the age<\/a> for starting colonoscopies from 50 to 45. \u201cSometimes people would get lost in the shuffle,\u201d he said, particularly those in Johnson\u2019s age group.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And Johnson himself has admitted to having blind spots in the past. \u201cGuys, I\u2019m an idiot,\u201d he wrote on X this spring<\/a>. \u201cAll this time I\u2019ve spent trying not to die, I had toxic turf\u201d \u2014 that is, artificial grass, which some people worry exposes them to hazardous chemicals<\/a> \u2014 \u201cin my backyard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Treating autoimmune gastritis<\/p>\n

Johnson paints a bleak picture of treatment options for autoimmune gastritis: \u201cstandard medical care concedes defeat, stating that nothing can be done except managing the condition, no matter how awful or lethal the effects,\u201d he writes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Cornish said, it\u2019s true that \u201cwe don\u2019t really have good treatments for it.\u201d People take iron orally or intravenously to address nutritional deficiencies, as Johnson did, and get monitored for stomach cancers. Patients with the condition are 13 times more likely<\/a> to develop neuroendocrine tumors; the goal is to catch the tumors early enough that they can be treated endoscopically, rather than surgically. Patients with autoimmune gastritis also have a higher risk of adenocarcinomas, a serious form of cancer.<\/p>\n

The reason neuroendocrine tumors are so common in patients with the condition, said Cornish, is a \u201cphysiological feedback loop. When you have low acid in your stomach, the stomach tries to increase the acid levels by secreting gastrin, which is supposed to be increasing the acid levels. But when you no longer have parietal cells to make acid, the acid levels never come up and the stomach just makes more gastrin.\u201d Enough gastrin eventually forms neuroendocrine tumors. If caught early, the prognosis<\/a> tends to be good.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Not content with these measures, Johnson said in his post that his team is looking at experimental interventions, including CAR-T therapy \u2014 a personalized form of gene therapy<\/a>\u00a0that\u2019s proved promising in various autoimmune patients<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

CAR-T therapy has not been well studied for this particular condition, said Cornish. \u201cIt\u2019s probably the best line of investigation for finding a cure in autoimmune gastritis. However, it\u2019s still very early.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Still, he said, \u201cit\u2019s encouraging to know that people are exploring CAR-T for this because, honestly, there\u2019s not a lot you can do to help these patients.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

For Johnson, the diagnosis comes as a relief. \u201cYou want to know if there is a problem with your body,\u201d he wrote on X<\/a> Tuesday. \u201cIgnoring it doesn\u2019t make it better. Delay just makes it harder, costlier, and riskier.\u201d<\/p>\n

STAT\u2019s coverage of chronic health issues is supported by a grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies<\/a>. Our financial supporters<\/a> are not involved in any decisions about our journalism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Longevity entrepreneur Bryan Johnson shared some bad news on social media recently. \u201cI have an autoimmune disease. My…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":751652,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[687,16347,13056,97,21450],"class_list":["post-751651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-cancer","tag-chronic-disease","tag-gene-therapy","tag-health","tag-patients"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=751651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/751652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=751651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=751651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=751651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}