Intestinal bacteria makes for healthful development

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A certain bacteria's presence actually engenders healthy growth of intestinal blood vessels.

Quote: "They have become master physiological chemists. They have developed chemical strategies that manipulate humans to benefit both them and us," he says.

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Littlek my personal opinion is based on some information I received from a biologist many years ago. Most bacteria is good the big three bad ones are really, really bad and you will die but they are rare.

All the concern about bacteria and spotlessness and air are a creation of marketing using scare tactics to sell their products I think. Most of the poisons in the home and work place come from the chemical emissions from the carpeting, the wall textures, coping machine, and the limited fresh air intake through the elevator shafts.

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Yep, the findings are not a surprise to me. There was one study that showed a postive link between good health and tape worms.

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I'm skeptical about the tape worms, but veterinary doctors have long been aware that certain micro- organisms aid in the digestion of food and others excrete nutrients in a form that is usable. Human doctors are slowly accepting that humans also need certain symbiotic bacteria. Neil

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Science, 9 July 2004. "Can Worms Tame the Immune System?"

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The idea may sound crazy, but it is buttressed by studies showing that treating mice with eggs, larvae, or extracts of helminths--parasitic worms such as flukes, flatworms, tapeworms, and pinworms--can dampen, and perhaps prevent, allergic reactions, reduce the severity of a multiple sclerosis (MS)-like disease, and block the development of type I diabetes (see sidebar). Recent data indicate that helminths may protect against disease by invigorating so-called regulatory T cells, which function as the immune system's police officers and keep it from running amok. Deficits in or problems with these cells could contribute to many types of immune disorders. "This is the first inkling there is a common thread between diabetes, asthma, and other immune disorders," says Richard Maizels, an immunologist at the University of Edinburgh, U.K. "We suddenly see a huge potential for establishing just how these immune pathologies are regulated."

Worm therapy is still experimental. Weinstock's IBD trials, which use pig worms that seem to be benign in humans, are the only real human tests of worm therapy thus far; it has yet to be tested in a large double-blind trial. "By no means is this [treatment] ready for prime time," says gastroenterologist Stephen Hanauer of the University of Chicago. Most researchers will not believe the early laboratory and clinical findings until they are reproduced, better explained, or possibly extended to other disorders. But if the data hold up, they could point the way to new medicine. The hope, says Maizels, is "to work out how helminths are doing it and reproduce that with a nonliving intervention." Adds Weinstock: "We're opening up the possibility of whole new classes of drugs."

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When i was 20 years of age, i contracted bacillary dysentary. The bacillus, Shiga broup B (technically, my condition was shigalosis), attacked the intestinal flora. With the near total destruction of my intestinal flora accomplished, i was no longer able to derive much nutritional benefit from what i ate (and i had pretty much lost interest in eating as it was), and i began to bleed in the intestines. I lost 65 pounds in ten days.

All praise to the intestinal flora--i'm gonna keep mine.

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Their benefit can be seen when you take a strong antibiotic, because it kills them, and you begin having digestive problems within a few days. When the antibiotics are discontinued, your digestion returns to normal -- well, unless something goes wrong and they don't come back correctly. In that case, you probably develop pseudo-membranous colitis, but that's another story.

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Set - did they treat your shigalosis with antibacterials?

JD - is shigalosis one of the big bad three?

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Lil' Kay, i couldn't tell you, i was delirious for ten days. I had been on IV because i wasn't able to eat, and after i "came to," i was put on a liquid and soft diet (soup, jello, juice, etc.). They may have had antibiotics in the IV, i couldn't say.

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As for shiga, i rather doubt that it is common. The most common form of dysentary is amoebic dystentary, caused by the amoeba hystolitica. The amoeba can survive in water, and therefore can spread like wildfire. In the case of shiga, one must injest infected feces--some clown at an Army mess hall who was infected had proceeded to food prepartion without washing his hands after using the facilities. Very disgusting--it doesn't bear thinking about. When i got to the point where my intestines were no longer bleeding, and was allowed solid food, i ate only at the hospital mess hall, or in the ville. I wouldn't eat in an Army mess hall after that, until i got back to the United States.

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ack!

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Recently studies are starting to show that the increase in asthma and allergies may be related to the exposure (or lack thereof) of children to mild irritants when they are young.

It seems that hypercleanliness is not a good way to raise most organisms.

Nobody has gone so far as to recommend feeding kids from dumpsters or anything, but in general, kids playing in the dirt, and wiping their noses on their sleeves may be more healthy habits for long term success than it would appear. And the "two second rule" for anything that falls on the floor may have to be extended Smile

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And they say that having more than one pet helps keep pet allergies down. I always thought it was five seconds.....

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littlek wrote:

And they say that having more than one pet helps keep pet allergies down. I always thought it was five seconds.....

See, it's already getting longer, wanna go for ten seconds? Smile

I guess the real question is, what do you do if it falls in the dirt, just wash it off and let 'em eat it, or ... leave the dirt on Wink

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Well, I care for little ones and I let them eat stuff that has fallen on the floor (I'm more concerned about a freshly cleaned floor thana slightly dirty one).

If there is clumps of dust or lots of animal fur, I either throw the food away or brush it off. I let them (the older one as a young tot and the younger one now) play in the dog's water bowl. And I let the currently tiny one put things like sand, grass and maple seeds in his mouth, but won't let him eat them (well, he prolly did eat some of the sand). My dog occasionally gives the kids french kisses and the baby occasionally licks her fur.

I'm no scientist, but I know stuff like that didn't hurt me as a kid and that these kids seem to weather these things quite well.

I also try to follow what science says about this type of stuff.

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I thought it was five seconds too. And that spelling is shigellosis, if I remember right. Shigella dysentery is a toughie, all right.

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Actually, in my house it wasn't any seconds, it was a get-it-before-your-siblings-or-the-dog-does rule.

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littlek wrote:

Actually, in my house it wasn't any seconds, it was a get-it-before-your-siblings-or-the-dog-does rule.

Actually, my advice is all second hand... I only know about this stuff by hearing it from people lucky enough to have kids.

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I find myself lucky to have the experience without actually having to have the kids.

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littlek wrote:

I find myself lucky to have the experience without actually having to have the kids.

Yup, a nice combination. And you still have time to get on the Internet. With your range of interests and activities those kids probably think you're the "coolest" nanny around (I'm just guessing of course) Wink

Best Regards,

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Intestinal bacteria makes for healthful development

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