What happens to the good bacteria if we take antibiotics?
In: Biology
The majority of posts in this thread are misleading. It is most certainly NOT so simple as other people have made it to be. This is the purview of the discipline of pharmacokinetics, which is extremely complicated.
Your gut flora exist in your intestines (primarily lower) which are typically not accessed until passage through your liver and then systemic circulation in your body.
Antibiotics are prescribed to tackle a specific infection in a specific area- for example an upper respiratory infection. Although the targeting is not perfect, the majority of the drug is intended to spend its lifetime in the area of infection, until it gets degraded, metabolized, or excreted. So that is one manner of control drug-makers have is formulating the pill such that the drug itself exists primarily in the area of effect.
Also, your gut flora are many, diverse, and can exist in super structures such as bio films. All of these things can help them withstand antibiotics over a new colony formed in your body (the infection you’re trying to treat). In addition, the antibiotic you’ve been given may be specific to the infection you have and this will not target some or even all of your gut flora.
Basically, it’s a complicated process. Bacteria are super resilient and it’s likely some of your microbiome survives the dosage of common antibiotics.
That being said, eating fermented foods is good and everyone should do that several times a week!
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