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More and more research nowadays suggests that we have gone too far with our desire to eliminate germs, and that children could use some dirt and grime to improve their own health. A new article published in the Journal of the Canadian Medical Association Monday doubles this idea and suggests that exposure of infants to common household cleaners could lead to obesity later in life. And everything comes back to one of the new favorite obsessions of modern medicine: the intestinal microbiome.
"You have this set of microbes in your gut that you depend on, for a lot of things you take for granted," says James Scott, a researcher studying environmental health at the University of Toronto. "It's interesting to see that they are subject to influences in your environment in ways you never imagined."
The jury is always about how intestinal bacteria are able to make us fat or keep us slim. But the evidence is already there that environmental factors can affect our weight gain and if intestinal bacteria actually play a role in how to burn fat and maintain weight, it should be considered what kind of external factors influence this relationship.
"The microbial community of the intestine that settles inside of us is very important to regulate the way we use the food we eat," Scott says. "When we eat things, we think we feed ourselves, but we feed mostly microbes. And what microbes do, it can lead us to use energy differently, "affecting the way we store fat and the robustness of our metabolism.
This is exacerbated by the fact that baby microbiomes are much more vulnerable to changes. "When a baby is born, there is not really a bacterial community in his gut," says Scott. It can take up to a year for these bacteria to settle and become home in our intestines, and this process is affected by all kinds of diseases and antibiotic treatments, including infant formula. or breast milk.
"Once you have an adult microbiome, it's a lasting and permanent thing," says Scott. Relatively speaking, diet and environmental changes can cause changes, even in adults. "But it's very fragile during this first year of life, especially in the first 100 days." Scott and his colleagues were interested in determining whether household cleaners, often antagonistic to bacteria, could have a tangible impact on the intestinal flora during this delicate period.
The latest findings are in fact part of a much larger Canadian birth cohort research project for the longitudinal development of healthy infants: a health, medicine and behavior database derived from more of 3,500 Canadian children to determine the environmental factors that lead to asthma and allergies in children. Over the years, the study – now 10 years old and more than 40 researchers – has grown considerably, creating opportunities to study childhood obesity.
For this particular study, Scott and his team collected and analyzed stool samples from 757 CHILD infants aged 3 to 4 months to profile each gut microbiota. The team also drew up an inventory of each infant's household for cleaning products to measure their exposure to disinfectants and multipurpose chemicals, and also measured body mass index at 1 and 3 years of age.
Together, the team found that children living in homes where antimicrobials were used at least once a week had a higher BMI at age 3 than children living in homes that were less frequently disinfected and where cleaning products were used. were "ecological" (that is, non-antibacterial). These infants with a higher BMI had microbiota profiles that appeared to match the findings, including lower levels of common intestinal bacteria such as Haemophilus and Clostridium.
The researchers were particularly struck by the fact that children exposed to more disinfectants were twice as likely to have Lachnospiracées, bacteria associated with higher rates of body fat and insulin resistance in animal studies. "We know that this is an important player in terms of the appearance of the mature microbiome," says Scott. Although there are hundreds and hundreds of species of bacteria living in our intestines, Scott says that only a small variety exerts the greatest influence on the nature of the microbiota.
But do not rush and start throwing your sprays and wet wipes away. There are many reasons to look at the results with a little caution. "One of the drawbacks of our study," says Scott, "is that we do not physically measure chemical residues, whether in dust samples or in biology, by examining blood or urine samples. . some samples. "The study is based on the assumption that home cleaning products have been used regularly, but without determining how far these products have been used. "There may be a subpopulation of individuals that we misclassify, who have the products but do not use them." And no distinction was made between specific ingredients, other than whether they were antibacterial or not.
In addition, the data do not take into account other important factors influencing the profile of intestinal bacteria, such as diet, antibiotic use, maternal overweight before pregnancy, and so on.
Scott himself admits that the results "do not demonstrate a relationship" between cleaning products and obesity. It is simply not enough to understand the biological mechanisms that encourage or attenuate the intestinal flora. Lachnospiracées. "The effect is a pretty weak effect, as far as we can tell. The relationship is important, but I would not say that they are very significant. And this meaning tells us nothing about the nature of the relationship.
Instead, Scott thinks that "the results give us an idea of what's going on and raise some very interesting questions. It is important that we go back and unravel the mechanisms. And he thinks that ongoing surveys with CHILD data give researchers the foundation needed to advance in follow-up studies.
In the end, until you have more data, you should focus on the same cleaning practices as most experts: disinfect things as needed, but do not overdo it. It's never a bad thing for babies and toddlers to get dirty from time to time.
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