We have many advances in our health care we can be thankful for today. Before the 1900’s the top related causes of death were due largely to contaminated food and water as well as an deficient housing and waste disposal system. Once we began to understand more about the invisible world full of bacteria, things like indoor plumbing and the sterilization of medical instruments were established. As time has passed, we have become more and more conscience about our personal hygiene. This has resulted in a significant decrease in infectious diseases.
However, while there has been a significant decrease in deaths due to infectious diseases, starting with the introduction of penicillin in the 1940’s, new issues within the disease related causes of death cropped up. Instead of dying of many infectious diseases, death from serious chronic conditions has gotten out of control. The main causes of death are not from poor hygiene, they are dying from the lack of something else.
And this is where our discussion turns to the endangered internal species as a result of antibiotics. The undeniable truth of this problem is – the destruction of bad bacteria by means of antibiotics also kills our wonderful probiotic bacteria friends.
While antibiotics have helped us eliminate so many diseases, the constant abuse of these medications, which includes prescribing them for illnesses that are virus related, such as the flue or even the common cold. Virus related illnesses are those that antibiotics cannot help. So, while sick with something non-bacterial you are killing off your bodies means of keeping it’s immune system in top condition, which only leads to being more susceptible to other illnesses.
With the misuse of antibiotics comes the introduction of the antibiotic resistant bacteria. This has produced a cycle that keeps getting worse. Drug companies continue to manufacture and develop stronger antibiotics and the abuses such as mentioned above continue to happen. It is a never ending cycle that is become quite frightening when you learn about the consequences.
So, where does this leave us? What is the solution?
It is not a secret that both bad and good bacteria are destroyed when taking these medications. If doctors know that antibiotics destroy our healthy flora, how come they don’t follow up their prescriptions with probiotics?
Although antibiotics have really reeked havoc on good bacterial growth, we have added to their damage by our more modern lifestyles. Fast food, soda, diet products, processed foods and the total lack of eating well-balanced meals are also to blame. We are living in a world of convenience which is running at a very fast pace. This causes a great deal of stress, lack of proper amounts of sleep, emotional distress and so forth. Our bodies are simply bombarded day in and day out. Our factory of health is exhausted. And we have only ourselves to blame.
So, how do we fix this problem? The answer is simple.
Helping our intestinal tract is just a matter of introducing the probiotics our bodies have lost and continue to lose daily. We can do this by adding into our diets the fruits, vegetables, yogurts and other foods that contain a wide variety of probiotics. We can also add them by way of probiotic powders, probiotic liquids and probiotic supplements.
In the next article I’ll be talking about some of the more common foods that we can buy to encourage our healthy probiotic bacteria to grow and outnumber the bad bacteria.
Article by Kimberly Shannon. If you missed the first article on probiotics you can find it at our breast cancer support site.
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