THE DECEPTION OF SOME ANTISEPTIC ADVERT

  

    KILLING OF BACTERIA FOR A STERILE ENVIRONMENT IN OUR HOMES 

In a bid to increase their sales, some manufacturers of detergents and antiseptics are conducting a vicious campaign misinforming the public that it is good to create a sterile environment on our bodies and in our homes because there are germs everywhere and they are all harmful. We are being persuaded to use antiseptic soaps and solutions in our bath water and on all surfaces and clothes that we clean. The companies inveigle the medical and nursing fellows to lend the credibility of their professions by uploading the lies contained in these advertisements. Member of these groups should realize that they are violating the ethics of their profession by contributing to shamefully misleading the public on the very issues they have the duty to educate us on.

Living organisms are indeed everywhere. Human beings think they are basically a sterile being, and regard the billions and trillions of other organisms that live on our bodies as unwelcome guests and parasites. This is far from the truth. If you could safely really sterilize a human being, inside and outside, he/she would not survive for more than a few days. The numerous organisms living with us actually evolved with us over the eons, and we depend on them as much as they depend on us.

This permanent commensal situation makes each one of us really a compound living organism, a sort of homo-fungo-bacteria-virus! Of course it does not sound pretty, but it is scientifically more accurate. Computer estimate shows that the number of bacteria in the colon alone is three times the number of cells in the entire human body, and we are not counting fungi or viruses. Friendly non-pathogenic bacteria live on all our internal and external surface that border the environment. Their successful competition with the pathogenic variety stops the latter from invading and causing disease. Elimination of the normal flora through unnecessary overuse of antiseptics and antibiotics permits pathogens to invade and cause disease. Two well-documented examples are the intractable diarrhea caused by infection with antibiotics resistant clostridium difficile or methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus. Recently, such infections have been cleared by transplantation of faeces from the colons of ‘normal’ people who have not abused antibiotics.

Most people know that bacteria in the intestine produce vitamins necessary for human health, but many more interesting aspects of the roles our bacteria play in our bodies are being discovered. For example, the incidence of asthma and auto-immune (auto-allergic) disease in the developed world is higher than in the developing countries. The reason may be that growing children in the developing countries are exposed to a greater variety of microorganisms and this develops their immunity. They are therefore better able to handle antigens in both the internal and external environment.

There are many other interesting functions of our resident body flora and recently some quite surprising and remarkable new claims are being made of the protective functions of these organisms, but they are still regarded as speculative until proven by scientific study. The evidence points to the useful interaction our bodies have with the bacteria and adopt dirty living. The consequences of poor hygiene culture are serious, and disease such as cholera, typhoid fever, guinea worm disease, and many other disease continue to wreak havoc on African countries, and we must not relax our effort to eradicate them. However, the wide use of antiseptics being promoted in our environment is a gimmick to increase profits and is not aimed at improving the health of the people. It represents overstepping the boundary of sanity and will in fact compromise the health of the people. Respectable health workers should not be involved in this disservice to their profession.