Antibacterial Cleaning Products are they really worth it in the Long Run?

It would seem that if soap kills germs and helps us to be healthier than antibacterial soap would kill more germs and help us to be even healthier. The problem is that antibacterial soaps and cleaners may be doing far more damage to our bodies and our environments than they are doing goods. Some scientists even propose that taking these products off of the shelf, or regulating the amount of them that can be used in residential settings would be the best course of action.

Antibacterial cleaners include substances such as triclosan, which is well known for being a bacteria killer. The problem is that the human body has good bacteria on it that it needs and triclosan cannot distinguish between the good bacteria that we need and the bad bacteria that is going to give us an intestinal bug,

The antibacterial cleaners can only kill what bacteria are susceptible to it. When you are sick the doctor has to write you a prescription for the antibiotic that is known to take care of the type of illness you have. Not all antibiotics work on all bacteria. The same is true of these antibacterial agents. Some bacteria are resistant to their effects. If you kill all of the susceptible bacteria with the cleanser you leave the non-responsive bacteria there with no competition so they can multiple even faster than before. Soon you have diseases and bacteria that are super-resistant because they have been exposed to the low doses so frequently that they adapt to it.

While we are using these antibacterial agents and creating stronger bacteria we are not killing the main cause for most human illnesses. Most of the diseases we catch are viral in nature and viruses are not affected by antibacterial cleansers or by antibiotics. The common cold can be relieved with some medications, but basically we have to let it run its course once we have been in contact with the virus. A normal cleanser is just as effective at removing the presence of viruses as the antibacterial versions are.

The ingredients in the antibacterial cleansers have been proven to cause fish to become sterile. With all of the people in all of the houses using some sort of antibacterial cleanser, large quantities of these killing chemicals are being flushed into the sewer systems. When the sewer water has been through its cleansing process at the sewer treatment facility it reenters our systems in lakes, streams, drinking water, and such. When the fish that are exposed to these chemicals for a long period of time become sterile then we start to reduce the world’s food supply through the use of these cleansers. It is even scarier to think that if these chemicals can cause fish to be sterile; can they cause human beings to also become sterile over a period of time?

Antibacterial cleansers are promoted as being the healthiest thing for you to use, but old timers say we all have to eat a peck of dirt in our lives. Maybe the old timers were right.