The downside of antibiotics is no longer a new discovery to most people, with antibiotics resistance being a current concern in societies

these days. Now, antibiotics given to babies have been linked to asthma; although there is no clear reason, antibiotics are said to be at least partly responsible for the steady rise in asthma cases. Of the 448 children, nearly half were given antibiotics in their first six months, a quarter had two courses, and a fifth had two or more courses. Test carried out revealed that 21 of the children developed asthma, in which attacks were triggered by environmental factors.

General information

Thesis Statement

Three main ideas : 1. 2. 3. nearly half were given antibiotics in their first six months - first idea a quarter had two courses - second idea and a fifth had two or more courses - third idea

In the past two decades, incidences of asthma in western countries have nearly doubled up to 7% of children suffering from it. However, only a handful of studies have attributed the blame on antibiotics, and these were suspect because they had to rely on the faulty memories of the parents. In light of this, Christine Johnson and her team at the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit followed 448 children from birth to age seven, regularly checking on their health.

The team reported a meeting of the European Respiratory Society that the children given antibiotics in their first half-year were 2.6 times as likely to develop allergic asthma. Those treated with broad-spectrum antibiotics, which kill a wide range of bacteria, were 8.9 times more likely to suffer from asthma. On top of that, the team also discovered that taking antibiotics in the first half-year of life increased the risk of allergies to things such as grass, dogs and cats by 50%. The effects of such antibiotics are amplified by known risk factors such having a parent with asthma, or having fewer than two household pets. A child who was given broad-spectrum antibiotic and whose family has no pets faced 11.5 time the risk of allergic asthma, this is because the immune system gets "bored".

However, since so many of the children being treated with antibiotics were ill with respiratory tract infections, the question arose whether it is possible that the infection, not the antibiotics, triggered the asthma attack, or that children prone to respiratory tract infections.

Johnson claims that the effect still holds true when all children with respiratory tract infection were excluded. She speculates that the antibiotics disrupt the developing immune system because they alter the bacterial communities in the gut, making it more difficult for a baby's immune system to learn to differentiate between good and bad bacteria. After all, antibiotics are known to known to destroy good bacteria together with the bad ones.