Is modern society really too clean and is it a danger to children's immune systems?

    Is modern society really too clean and is it a danger to children's immune systems?

    According to a study, the theory that modern society is too clean, leading to a faulty immune system, no longer makes sense.

    He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him

    According to a new study, the theory that modern society is too clean, leading to a faulty immune system in children, no longer makes sense. It is more true, rather, that cleanliness and domestic hygiene do not affect as much as exposure to the natural environment





    Clean yes but without going crazy. It has always been thought that washing excessively at home could have a profoundly negative impact on the immune system of children in the long run. But that doesn't always seem to be true. Or not entirely.

    Researchers from UCL and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine start from another premise: in medicine, the so-called "hygienic hypothesis”States that early childhood exposure to particular microorganisms protects against allergic diseases by contributing to the development of the immune system. However, in the general opinion, 21st century Western society is too hygienic, which means that babies and children are much more likely to be less exposed to germs in early childhood and therefore become less resistant to allergies.

    In the study, published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, the researchers point to four significant reasons that, they say, refute this theory and conclude that no, we are not "too clean for our own good".

    Exposure to microorganisms early in life is essential for the 'education' of the immune and metabolic systems, says lead author, Emeritus Professor of Medical Microbiology Graham Rook (UCL Infection & Immunity). The organisms that populate our intestines, skin and airways also play an important role in maintaining our health until old age: therefore throughout our life we ​​need exposure to these beneficial microorganisms, mainly derived from our mothers, from other family members and the natural environment.

    But for more than 20 years there has been a public narrative that hand and household hygiene practices, which - beware - remain essential to stop exposure to pathogens that cause disease, are also blocking exposure to beneficial organisms.


    In this paper, we have set out to reconcile the apparent conflict between the need for cleanliness and hygiene to keep us free from pathogens and the need for microbial inputs to populate our guts and set up our immune and metabolic systems.


    The researchers point to four factors:

    • firstly, the microorganisms present in a modern home are, to a significant extent, not what we need for immunity
    • secondly, the researchers insist on concrete evidence that it is rather the microorganisms of the natural and external green environment that are particularly important for our health; cleanliness and domestic hygiene do not, on the other hand, affect our exposure to the natural environment
    • some research - continues the research - also shows that when epidemiologists find an association between house cleaning and health problems such as allergies, this is often not caused by the removal of organisms, but rather by theexposure of the lungs to cleaning products that cause a type of damage that favors the development of allergic responses
    • Ultimately, the research also gives a little space to vaccines

    In short, all factors that do not conflict with intelligently targeted hygiene or house cleaning. 

    So cleaning the house thoroughly is good as well as personal cleaning - concludes Professor Rook. To prevent the spread of an infection, hygiene must be aimed at the hands and the surfaces with which we are most often in contact. By targeting our cleaning practices, we also limit children's direct exposure to cleaning agents.


    Fonti: UCL / Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology


    Read also:

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