Antibiotics

[Alison]

I still get amoxicillin for chest infections and trimethoprim for urinary.

Has anything really changed ??

[Serial_Apologist]

Pro-biotics are stuff and nonsense, your gut does not need them, they are a marketing ploy. and in the same league as those cholesterol lowing spreads (of which you would have to eat a tub a day to get any benefit)
If people could stop being so super hygienic, and killing the good guys along with the bad, we wouldn't have so many people with allergies.

I never knew there were such things as pro-biotics

[ahinton]

Pro-biotics are stuff and nonsense, your gut does not need them, they are a marketing ploy.

I don't entirely agree with that, although I do accept that there's undue marketing hype around them (just as there is for so much else).

and in the same league as those cholesterol lowing spreads (of which you would have to eat a tub a day to get any benefit)

No and yes; they're not in the same league as this rubbish at all and, whilst you would indeed "need to eat a tub a day to get any benefit", the adverse consequence of doing so should be plainly obvious!

If people could stop being so super hygienic, and killing the good guys along with the bad, we wouldn't have so many people with allergies.

That may well be the case in some instances.

What's Welsh for antibiotic?

[Anna]

I never knew there were such things as pro-biotics

Marketing ploy, to frighten people and, hence, to make money. Did your granny feel the need for introducing friendly bacteria into her diet? Or your Mum or Dad, did they live long without this cynical ploy?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11926609

.What's Welsh for antibiotic?

gwrthfiotig. or dimbuggio

[teamsaint]

I'm discovering 4... I'm going to start a Schumann thread. I'd like to hear more.

Like and Antibiotic to life's up and downs old Bobby. I'll join in the thread...see you there !

[LeMartinPecheur]

'Functional foods' are clearly the new growth market for the food industry. Just so long as we can be confident that they really do function 'like it says on the tin', and haven't got any so-far-unsuspected 'functions' which will be found to have done for us a few years hence.

Luckily I'm a trading standards officer and it's my job to know all this stuff. (Strictly, it used to be, since our splendid gov't no longer counts me as 'food qualified') You can of course be confident that trading standards services are all fully resourced(*) and trained enough to do this and are particularly good at looking into crystal balls so as to be ahead of current scientific research. And commercial 'innovation', overt and overt, (= cost-cutting all too often) too of course

(*) 15-20% cuts in the last few years and probably at least as much still to come over the next four. And that's assuming there's no disaster for the economy ahead, like a pound, dollar or euro collapse.

[mangerton]

Marketing ploy, to frighten people and, hence, to make money. Did your granny feel the need for introducing friendly bacteria into her diet? Or your Mum or Dad, did they live long without this cynical ploy?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11926609

gwrthfiotig. or dimbuggio

I rather like "dimbuggio". Pronounced as it looks?

[vinteuil]

I rather like "dimbuggio". Pronounced as it looks?

... I think she's pulllling our llegs, llook you

[Serial_Apologist]

I rather like "dimbuggio".

Me too!

Pronounced as it looks?

I'm willing to bet "gwrthfiotig" is!

[Anna]

I rather like "dimbuggio". Pronounced as it looks?

Oh, My Good Lord, sorry, like DimParcio (no parking allowed) DimBuggio (no bugs allowed) the Welsh are, occasionally, odd.

[Flosshilde]

I value your consistency, Bryn, in all matters, both musical and otherwise. Though I would wager you are one of the least inclined to leap in with puerile repudiations and ganging up, but offer a more considered riposte.

Anyway, thank you for your post, which has given me an inkling of things I would otherwise have been ignorant of. It does sound like aberrant and wilfully contentious behaviour.

I think another point worth making about Simon (and Ressurection Man, for that matter) is that he rarely engages in a discussion - he lobs in a grenade & then runs. When people ask him a question, or challenge his (usually) contentious statements, he rarely responds.

[mangerton]

Oh, My Good Lord, sorry, like DimParcio (no parking allowed) DimBuggio (no bugs allowed) the Welsh are, occasionally, odd.

No, I'm sure they're not really. Maybe I'm just being Dim, but "Parcio", "Buggio".... "Scorchio"? I mean, I can hear an Italian Welsh person saying these words, but is that how you do it, or are the consonants hard?

PS You'll notice I'm not pursuing "gwrthfiotig".

PPS You think you've got problems? In Scotland we have Gaelic (pron "Gallic", NOT "Gaylic", btw) to contend with. It's great on the radio. You hear a long unintelligible tirade, interspersed with the occasional English word ("internet", "digital television", "Nick Clegg") for which there is apparently no Gaelic equivalent.

[Flosshilde]

"Nick Clegg") for which there is apparently no Gaelic equivalent.

[Flay]

Totally agree with your #60, Anna. I have often wondered how these pro-biotic bugs are supposed to get through to the large bowel without being killed off in the process. I suppose a pro-biotic yoghurt enema would do the trick!

Richard put it well in his initial posting, I cannot better it. There is a difficult, insatiable demand for antibiotics: a human right to be un-poorly.

We need public health promotion information films again, to get these messages through. Health information could easily be wormed into TV programmes like Eastenders. How many people do we see leaving a loo without washing their hands, for example? How often do we see people spitting? Coughing into their palms...

[Flosshilde]

I suppose a pro-biotic yoghurt enema would do the trick!

Which reminds me of my mis-understanding when women in the 70s said that the best treatment for thrush was live yoghurt.