Antibiotics in Early Life Could Lead to Brain Disorders:
Antibiotic exposure early in life could alter human brain development in areas responsible for cognitive and emotional functions, according to a Rutgers researcher.
The laboratory study, published in the journal iScience, suggests that penicillin changes the microbiome — the trillions of beneficial microorganisms that live in and on our bodies — as well as gene expression, which allows cells to respond to its changing environment, in key areas of the developing brain. The findings suggest reducing widespread antibiotic use or using alternatives when possible to prevent neurodevelopment problems.
Penicillin and related medicines (like ampicillin and amoxicillin) are the most widely used antibiotics in children worldwide. In the United States, the average child receives nearly three courses of antibiotics before the age of 2. Similar or greater exposure rates occur in many other countries.
Journal Reference:
Angelina Volkova, Kelly Ruggles, Anjelique Schulfer, et al. “Effects of early-life penicillin exposure on the gut microbiome and frontal cortex and amygdala gene expression” 15 July 2021 iScience (DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2021.102797)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Spamalope on Wednesday August 04 2021, @04:16AM (7 children)
The problem is that quality probiotics aren't prescribed with (and following) antibiotics. The guy biome has at least a regulatory role for lots of body and especially brain function feedback loops.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday August 04 2021, @05:32AM
I've definitely wondered about any studies on this, particularly because "probiotics" seem to be currently outside of existing medical protocols. Fecal transplants, though ... ?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @05:46AM (4 children)
Eat yogurt, saurkraut, kimchi, avakaya.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @12:14PM (3 children)
>> Eat yogurt, saurkraut, kimchi, avakaya.
Eat yoghurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, avocado. FTFY.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Wednesday August 04 2021, @02:16PM (2 children)
Since when are avocados probiotic? Or avakaya for that matter? Yogurt, saurkraut, and kimchi are all fermented foods loaded with live bacteria that can help recolonize your gut. Avocados are just fruit. Avakaya is... Indian mango pickles? Wikipedia doesn't mention any fermenting, and pickling typically destroys all the naturally occurring microbes.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @04:25PM
There was a study to see the best locally available foods to feed children who had suffered severe malnutrition (starvation), to restore their gut microbiome. They came up with bananna, peanuts, soy and garbanzo beans.
Rice and lentils were found to be detrimental to the gut microbiome.
https://www.europeanscientist.com/en/public-health/restoring-healthy-gut-bacteria-could-help-starving-children/ [europeanscientist.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @06:48PM
OK ditch that. Put this in your mouth, it's covered in bacteria.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @05:57PM
If it doesn't make pharmaceutical corporations lots of money and doesn't need a prescription so that you have to pay to see a doctor to obtain it then why should the medical community get behind it?
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @04:38AM
Who doesn't have a "brain disorder?" Are we cookie-cutter robots?
I hate garbage "science" articles like this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @12:19PM
Impossible. Long term effects of medicine always make themselves apparent in a couple of months. We know all the effects of penicillin. Clinical trials.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @01:09PM (8 children)
Not vaccines, but antibiotics for every sniffle. That's why autism.
Now figure out what we're doing to boys that causes 5 times as much autism. Protip for feminists: the problem is not the boys. Gender is a social construct, remember? Idiots.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @01:16PM (7 children)
Well let me throw a hypothesis out there, because feminism the philosophy is generally correct unlike feminism the right-wing pseudo-fascist inherently-exclusionary bourgeois political movement. So let's combine what we know.
Maybe parents bring their sons to the doctor for colds and demand better ("better", well, as "science" funded by pharmaceutical companies who throw away science that doesn't agree with their marketing team says is "better") treatment more often than for daughters.
There you go. There's a hypothesis. 5x autism in boys because patriarchy and johnny needs an antibiotic for his sniffle that's caused by a virus.
Fucking idiots. Humans are all fucking idiots.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @01:26PM (2 children)
Also whatabout circumcision. Is there a doctor in the house yet? I know the attitude with routine infant male genital mutilation is to throw caution about unnecessary cosmetic surgery on infants to the wind and just go "I turned out just fine so Gawd's gonna take care of minime too!" (Except of course the 300 infant boys who die every year from unnecessary cosmetic surgery.)
Anyway, what I wanted to ask was are antibiotics routinely used in post-op circumcision care?
Finally is the 5x number Murrica Fuck Yeah only or does that also show up in less patriarchal societies where men have rights like in Europe?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @01:35PM (1 child)
Postscript: also sports. Gotta get antibiotics for sports injuries probably, and gotta force boys to play sports to "man them up" (i.e. ritual hazing and brutalization, preparation for being available for conversion into killing machines to defend my liberal bourgeois interests abroad).
Could be a ton of factors explained by patriarchy that add up to the 5x number. It can't be testosterone despite bourgeois feminists propaganda, so what else could it be?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @06:51PM
> liberal bourgeois interests
SCREEEECH!!!! Back the fuck up. Whut?!?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by HiThere on Wednesday August 04 2021, @01:41PM (3 children)
That's a plausible hypothesis, but it's also true that boys *do* get sick more often than girls. I'm not sure that starts while infants though, as it may well be related to being more exploratory and less cautious.
OTOH, I got tonsillitis so often they felt they HAD to remove the tonsils, as they have become permanently infected. (Yeah, it was common back then, but I really was getting sick) while my sister didn't have that problem. Each time I got tonsillitis I had a LOT of antibiotics. And I, personally, wasn't that exploratory (though admittedly more-so than my sister).
Biology is complex, and anecdotes aren't data, but personally *I* tend to feel that boys probably have generally weaker immune systems than girls. Not by a whole bunch, but enough to show up in population studies. So your hypothesis while plausible doesn't feel necessary.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @06:12PM (1 child)
no, you were just weak. there was no such phenomenon in my childhood with my siblings.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 05 2021, @10:38AM
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2008-05-25-0805240292-story.html [chicagotribune.com]
Boys get sicker than girls and more often than girls.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @06:53PM
Healthy boys don't touch themselves. Healthy boys love sports. Healthy boys support the troops. Why do you hate America, friend?
(Score: 3, Touché) by darkfeline on Wednesday August 04 2021, @08:07PM (3 children)
We're discovering new things about penicillin, a century old drug? Unbelievable.
Thankfully, we already know all there is to know about a drug that was created last year, so there will be no issues trying to administer it to the entire population.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 05 2021, @05:52AM
I understand your hesitancy, but the quarterly earnings are due soon!
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday August 05 2021, @07:14AM (1 child)
Imagine you are falling out of an airplane. You happen to have a parachute on your back, but it is a new model that hasn't gotten much testing. What will you do?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 05 2021, @10:30AM
Nothing, because the airplane is a grounded Cessna.