More and more research and studies point to the fact that there is a very strong connection between our gut and our overall health and wellbeing.
And now a new study has found that disrupting the early development of a healthy gut microbiome can end up doing serious long-term damage.
According to a study on mice at Monash University, published in the April issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology, researchers found that that the use of antibiotics when you are young can lead to inflammatory diseases like multiple sclerosis, inflammatory bowel syndrome and asthma in adulthood.
Antibiotics are important and sometimes a necessary evil, but health experts have long been warning us that the medicine is being far too frequently prescribed and used, something which is leading to more and more people becoming immune to the effects of it.
Another problem with the use of antibiotics is that they upset the body’s delicate bacterial balance – which we now know is so important for a well-functioning immune system.
It is estimated that as much as 70 percent of our immune system is contained in the gut, where trillions of bacteria that play a crucial role in our physical and mental health. And antibiotics can cause serious damage, especially in children, who are still developing their immune systems. In fact, one single course of antibiotics can indiscriminately kill off hundreds of important strains of healthy bacteria alongside the bad bacteria it aims to target.
This is what John Wherry, Ph.D., deputy editor of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology, where the study was published, had to say:
“Our intestinal bacteria are now understood to have a major role in shaping immune health and disease, but the details for this process remain poorly understood,” Wherry explained in a press release.“These new studies provide an important clue as to how the early signals from our gut bacteria shape key immune cells and how these neonatal events can shape disease potential later in life.”
Wherry thinks the findings add growing weight to the idea that targeting gut bacteria may be an important way to treat inflammatory diseases.
