Do Antibiotics Contribute To Obesity? 252
sciencehabit writes "Farmers have long used antibiotics to make cows, pigs, and turkeys gain weight faster. Now, scientists claim that receiving antibiotics early in life may also make children grow fat (abstract). The researchers believe the drugs change the composition of the bacterial population in the gut in a crucial developmental stage that may have a long-lasting impact."
Oh goody. (Score:2, Insightful)
Just what we need... yet another anti-medicine headline. I'll go ahead and invoke the rule [wikipedia.org]: No.
Look, parents... it's not the antibiotics making your kids fat, it's you feeding them too much, then telling them to clean their plate because kids in Africa are starving. It's not the antibiotic-resistant superbugs making your kids sick, it's the day care center and school you send them to with myriad other kids and their bacterial cornucopia. It's not the vaccines giving your kids learning disabilities, it's the school's beancounters putting pressure on the psychiatrist to get those special-education dollars.
It's not that hard to live a healthy and decent life: Do not do anything to excess, and listen to what your body wants. When it wants rest, rest. When it wants exercise, do something active. When it wants food, eat. Do nothing more than what's reasonable, and do nothing less than what's sufficient.
No. (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason 85% of Americans over age 30 are fat is because (1) they eat too much sugar and (2) too large portions. See the video "sugar the bitter truth".
It seems people keep trying to blame other things (too much TV, too much gaming, too much bacteria or antibiotics) instead of themselves. You weighed 120-140 when you were 18 (less for girls)..... no reason you can't weigh that now.
Re:Sugar consumption makes kids get fat (Score:4, Insightful)
Fruit juice is a horrible way to get your vitamins. Eat the actual fruit which includes the fiber (also an important ingredient). I'm gonna go eat some fiber right now: Popcorn.
Re:Oh goody. (Score:5, Insightful)
Just what we need .. yet another self-righteous poster who didn't bother to read the freaking article. No one is saying that antibiotics are the sole or even the major reason that children are fat. No one is denying that over-eating is a huge reason for obesity. All these scientists have concluded is that, based on their analysis of evidence, babies who were exposed to antibiotics within the first six months of life were more prone to being overweight at 10, 20, and 38 months of age. They only reported this correlation, and cautioned that there was no causal relationship yet.
But no matter. Random Internet poster dude who didn't read the article is going to rail against anti-medicine when it is actually he who is railing against a team of scientists making a scientific conclusion.
Re:They Do, Just Not By Much (Score:2, Insightful)
Sadly their interpretation is not what I expect to be hearing soon in my (liberal-biased) community. Instead, I'll hear something like "See? This is one more reason not to use antibiotic cleanser in my bathroom, even when sick!"
Sounds good to me. They're doing the right thing for the wrong reason, but it is better than doing the wrong thing for the wrong reason.
I have two friends who are experts in the area - one who currently research on the effects of antibiotic resistance in medical context, another who is a food microbiologist and worked with research on food preservatives for two decades (and has a PhD on it) and now is a pensioner, but somewhat active. I've talked to both of them about antibiotic soaps. Both says that antibiotic soaps are pointless and very mildly harmful. Just use bleach if you need to sterilize (very little risk of cross-mutations), and otherwise use normal soap. I asked the medical microbiologist about whether this was an effect that was dangerous in the large (as the soaps contribute to creating antibiotic resistance), but he thought thought it wasn't an important source of antibiotic resistance overall, and more likely to be a problem for the families that use it than create an overall antibiotic resistance.
Of course, if you do this just as you're ill, you're doing it just at the time when you're likely to create your own personal antibiotic-resistant strain of something that *do* infect humans, so it's the worst possible time to do it.
And I'll keep my kids far away from the hospital, because they use antibiotics everywhere!"
Reasonable advice if you can keep to it, especially for hospitals in areas where the medical profession is careless about prescribing antibiotics. A hospital is for when you really need it.
Don't get me wrong: I think antibiotics are fantastic drugs - in fact, I think they are the best drugs ever invented. I just think they're being abused in most of the world, and that this is unfortunate - it risks destroying their usefulness, for no benefit whatsoever, and with some immediate harm (an antibiotic cure will upset your natural bacterial fauna). If we keep people from demanding antibiotics when they're not needed (and therefore decrease the amount of prescriptions when they're not needed) because people are afraid of getting fat, that's a good effect.
Sensational journalism is a disservice to the research it presents. Kudos to NPR for trying to keep things level-headed.
I concur. Just be careful in both directions.
Re:Bulletin!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
Eating too much, especially too much fatty foods, makes you fat.
Eating does not make you fat. Marriage makes you fat. Compare the waistlines of your single and married friends, and you'll see what I mean.
A bachelor opens his refrigerator, looks at what is inside, and then goes to bed. A married man goes to bed, looks what is in inside, and then goes to the refrigerator.
For the love of god! (Score:4, Insightful)
I used to work with a Morbidly obese man that ate 3 LARGE subs from the local sub place every day. He would also order a full sized bag of potato chips along with it which he wouldn't eat with the subs... he'd finish the subs, then need to go to the bathroom to drop a deuce and would take the chips with him and eat them while he was taking a dump. Not kidding. He would sit in there for 45 minutes crapping, eating his chips and talking to people that came and went from the bathroom as he did. It was insane.
One day I walked by his desk and instead of his usual 3 subs he had a full rotisary chicken and a 2 liter of coke (not diet) sitting on his desk. I stopped in shock and asked "Why do you have a rotisary chicken on your desk?!?" He replied "My doctor has had me on a diet for months and I'm just not loosing weight. I've been sticking to turkey sandwiches, but they weren't working so he told me to try chicken instead. They don't have chicken subs at the sub place so I picked this up at the grocery store." He then proceeded to pick the rotisary chicken clean.
If you're over 200lbs it's either because you don't exorcise or your a body builder. If you're over 250, it's because you don't exorcise and you eat too much (or your an Olympic body builder) STOP EATING
Re:They Do, Just Not By Much (Score:4, Insightful)
The answer, like all good scientific answers, is maybe – with many different avenues. There is a feedback loop between antibiotics, obesity, and nutation that we are just figuring out.
For a better article, go to the Economist’s “Me, Myself, US”. There are a lot of other good articles out there. http://www.economist.com/node/21560523 [economist.com]. The NPR Article is only a small part of the beginning of the bigger question on how we interact with our friendly bacteria.
Feed cows antibiotics and you change their gut flora – change the gut flora and you change how fast they can put on weight.
Or better yet, take a look at fat mice/humans and skinny mice humans – they have different gut flora and thus different nutritional profiles (production of vitamins, storage of fat, etc.). Swap skinny/fat and the gut flora follows. Swap gut flora and the nutritional profile follows.
Re:They Do, Just Not By Much (Score:5, Insightful)
People don't just get fat because a random chemical made them gain weight.
You cannot violate the laws of thermodynamics -- people are fat because they eat more and burn less.
Look at people in concentration camps. They were experimented with all kinds of chemicals on them and yet, they look emaciated. The reason? They did not have enough food (the only exception is perhaps the Kwashiorkor syndrome which is caused by protein and nutritional deficiency and water retention, but even they look emaciated -- just with fat bellies and such caused by oedema).
As a society, we've made it incredibly easy for people to consume a lot of calories with very little effort. That's why people are fat. People eat more when they should be eating less, people drive when they should be walking and running, and people do not part-take in any physical activities.
When was the last time you know when people you know played a game regularly? Some friends of mine and I play tennis regularly at a neighborhood park, and we are amazed at just how empty the tennis, basketball, soccer, baseball, and all the other courts are. Even on weekends with great weather.
When was the last time you could get a 4 oz or 8 oz drink? When was the last time you could ask for half or a quarter of the portion size? Last year, when my wife and I came back from traveling in Asia and Europe, we landed in NYC and went to grab some good old American food. I was amazed when the size of the soup and salad that were brought to me was at least 4x the size of a large portion in Asia and Europe.
People are fat because they've become lazy slobs who cannot do portion control and who do not give a shit about getting in shape. Let's stop looking for reasons and excuses and call it for what it is -- gluttony and sloth.