The sales of hand sanitizers have skyrocketed since Covid-19. I have seen many people carrying it in their bags. From hand sanitizers to antibacterial soaps, we’re constantly battling germs. During the pandemic it was considered important to implement drastic sanitation protocols. From elevator buttons to shopping carts, many were wiping them down with sanitizers! Some people are still wearing a mask, wiping around with sanitizer, and washing their hands with disinfectant soap.
There are many diseases that are said to have increased after Covid-19, such as allergies, autoimmune diseases, and inflammatory bowel disease. Most of the articles say it is due to having covid, but is that the only reason?
You are often told to take probiotics such as lactobacilli and bifidobacteria. Fermented foods such as natto (fermented soybeans), kimchi, and pickles are also good for regulating the intestinal environment, and some people consume them diligently. However, many people complain of constipation or diarrhea that is not resolved, or of feeling bloated or gassy.
It is said that there are 10 times as many microbial cells in the human intestine as in the entire human body, numbering approximately 100 trillion, or 5,000 different types. Intestinal bacteria include “bacteria that do good things for the body (good bacteria),” “bacteria that do bad things for the body (bad bacteria),” and “bacteria that work together with a large number of good and bad bacteria (opportunistic bacteria),” all of which are fed by the food we eat and form the balance between good and bad health. So, if you take only probiotic-type good bacteria diligently, the good bacteria will multiply and the bad bacteria will decrease. Then the good bacteria stop doing their job (strong bactericidal power and protection of the intestinal mucosa)! In addition, no matter how good the food is for you, if you consume too much of it, you may develop small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO), which can grow in the large intestine and pass into the small intestine.
The same kind of condition is said to occur in an excessively clean environment, Hygiene Hypothesis. The hygiene hypothesis is an idea, proposed based on epidemiological data, that humans need to be exposed to bacteria in order to develop a healthy immune system. This hypothesis, proposed by Strachan of the University of London, England, in 1989, says that without early contact with microorganisms and parasites, the immune system is suppressed and susceptible to allergic diseases.
Since then, a series of papers have been published suggesting that the sanitary environment during a child’s upbringing plays a role in the onset of allergies, and you have probably heard that children raised in homes with two or more dogs or cats indoors when they are under one year old are less likely to develop allergies later in life. There are also published studies showing that children raised on livestock farms have fewer allergic symptoms than children raised in non-farm households living in the same area.
A 2015 study published in the international peer-reviewed journal Occupational & Environmental Medicine found that in the homes of more than 9,000 children aged 6 to 12 years in Spain, the Netherlands, the families that used bleach for cleaning had higher rates of infections such as influenza, tonsillitis, sinusitis, bronchitis, and pneumonia, than those that didn’t use bleach.
It is good to be clean, but that doesn’t mean that we are referring to “sterilization”. Before buying a probiotic supplement, you might need to pay attention to how you deal with germs. Hand sanitizers and disinfectant soaps may be unnecessary. And, as I have written many times, please consult with your doctor to see if you really need to take antibiotics as well when they are offered. This is a particularly important issue for infants and toddlers. In the old days, meat, fish, and vegetables were sold unpackaged at the store, and seasonings such as miso were mainly sold by weight. So, in a good way, we also unknowingly introduced a variety of germs, and as a result, we probably had a wide variety of intestinal bacteria. So, going outside to play in the dirt and get covered in mud may be closer to health than taking lactobacillus and bifidobacterium yogurt.
Reference:
https://www.livescience.com/covid-19-linked-to-40-increase-in-autoimmune-disease-risk-in-huge-study
https://the21.php.co.jp/detail/3575
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8007786/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4191858/
Your Body, Your Health, Your Life 