Good gut bacteria may a ect babies’ risk of asthma

WASHINGTON ( AP) — Gut checks suggest that not having enough of certain “good” intestinal germs early in life may increase babies’ risk of developing asthma, according to a new study of more than 300 children.

Wait: what could gut bacteria have to do with a lung disease? We share our bodies with trillions of microbes that play key roles in keeping us healthy — and different combinations of bacteria in the gut are thought to shape the immune system in ways that can affect the risk of a variety of diseases.

Wednesday’s study raises the provocative possibility of one day altering tots’ buildup of protective bugs, maybe through probiotics.

“I want to emphasize that we're not ready for that yet,” cautioned study co-author Dr. Stuart Turvey, a pediatric immunologist at the University of British Columbia and BC Children's Hospital. But a “vision for the future would be to prevent this disease.”

Asthma has been on the rise in recent decades, and is estimated to affect 300 million people worldwide and nearly 10 percent of US children. While medications can help control the wheezing and airway inflammation, asthma is a common reason for childhood hospitalizations and severe attacks can be life-threatening at any age.

Babies begin accumulating their own custom bacterial community, or microbiome, at birth. Which bugs they acquire is a haphazard process, starting with whether they were born vaginally or by C-section. But previous studies have shown that babies treated with antibiotics before their first birthday were more likely to be diagnosed later with asthma; the drugs can kill good germs as well as harmful ones.