Vaccines, Antibiotics, and Antibacterial Cleaners: Are they helping or hurting us?

Germs, Viruses, and Vaccines — by Catherine Morgan (cross-posted at BlogHer)

My last post was about germs and protecting yourself from them. For this post, I will be exploring why being “germ free” may actually be doing more harm than good. Let’s start by looking at the Antibacterial Cleaners that have become so popular in our “germ-a-phobe” society. Could it be that our fight against the “germ” is actually causing our lives to be “Too clean“, and possibly less healthy?

The problem with trying to eliminate germs, bacteria, and viruses from our lives, is that our immune systems need the opportunity to fight off these things. When we don’t use our immune system, we allow it to atrophy. And then, when we do become exposed to something it should be able to fight off, our immune system can forget what it’s suppose to do.