"Antibiotic Resistance Genes in the Guts of Vegetarians vs. Meat-Eaters"
There are nearly a million salmonella and campylobacter infections
in children 10 and younger each year in the United States.
Some of these infections are severe, causing meningitis and death, and
requiring treatment with antibiotics. The problem is that there's
an increasing problem of antibiotic resistance among
these bugs that threatens our ability to treat them.
Part of the problem is that the same life-saving miracle-drug antibiotics
are being squandered for use in food animals
for things like growth promotion
in such unhygienic, crowded conditions,
which increases the likelihood that pathogens like salmonella
or campylobacter will become resistant,
and I've done a bunch of videos on that.
But there's another problem. The resistance determinants,
the genes that encode antibiotic resistance,
may be transmitted from food animals to humans through the food supply.
See, most resistant bacteria have mobile genetic elements,
like these little circles of DNA called plasmids,
that carry the resistance genes that they can then pass on
to other bacteria, including those in our own gut.
Food animals are, therefore, a reservoir of antibiotic resistance
genes and a potential vector for transmission
of antibiotic resistance genes to the human intestinal microbiome.
In this study, transfer of an antibiotic resistance plasmid
from an E. coli originating from a chicken raised for meat
to human gut bugs was assessed by using a model
that mimics the human intestines. And it happened within two hours.
This spread of antibiotic resistance genes presents an alarming scenario,
a growing concern that antibiotic resistant bacteria present on food
can transfer their resistance genes to the inherent gut microbiome
of the consumer.
But you don't know until you put it to the test.
Assessing antibiotic resistance gene loads in vegan vs. vegetarian
vs. omnivore gut bacteria.
You'd think the results might be obvious,
but antibiotic resistance genes are spread due to
manure application on agricultural fields of fruits and vegetables.
Yes, massive antibiotic use in animal farming is considered
as the greatest contributor to the presence of antibiotic-resistant
bacteria in food of animal origin: meats, eggs, and dairy.
Nevertheless, sewage from treated animals may impact
on vegetables grown on fertilized fields,
but it was largely unknown whether, and to what extent,
antibiotic-resistant bacteria are being transferred to vegetables
and then to the human gut until now.
Researchers looked for antibiotic- resistant genes against sulfa drugs
like bactrim, tetracyclines, penicillins and cephalosporins,
and streptomycin-type antibiotics
and both omnivores and vegetarians showed a signigicantly higher
antibiotic-resistant gene load in their guts
as compared with vegans.
There wasn't a significant difference between omnivores and vegetarians,
but significantly lower loads in vegans compared to omnivores,
and vegans compared to vegetarians, the first evidence
that a vegan lifestyle is associated with
a reduced load of human gut antibiotic-resistant genes,
but not the last.
Fewer tetracycline resistance genes in vegan guts and
more vancomycin resistance genes in the guts of those who eat meat.
No surprise, since they found a correlation between
tetracycline resistance genes
and the intake of eggs, milk, and cheese ---
I like how there are so many types of milk these days
they have to specify "milk from animal sources."
And a higher incidence of vancomycin resistance genes
was found in consumers of eggs, poultry, fish, and seafood.
And vancomycin is one of our antibiotics of last resort, used to
treat serious life-threatening strep and staph infections
like MRSA (M-R-S-A).
Despite the links to dairy and eggs, just cutting out meat
has indeed been shown to offer an advantage in some studies,
as bacteria obtained from meat-eater poop samples showed resistance
to a greater number of antibiotics and carried more tested
antibiotic resistance genes compared to the vegan or vegetarian poop.