Surprise: Antibiotics May Be Contributing To The Obesity Epidemic

[Julieanne]

No author
April 3, 2012

Worse, their overuse may also increase our cancer risk.

We’ve been telling you about the global threat of superbugs. Much of it comes from handing out antibiotics like medicinal candy to humans or as dietary supplements to animals. Now there’s new evidence of the negative effect of antibiotics on our weight as well as a potentially devastating effect on our children’s (and children’s children’s) health.

Microbiologists at New York University have published a new study that says the overprescribing of antibiotics could be making us fat! Researchers fed infant mice low doses of penicillin; after 30 weeks, penicillin-fed mice were between 10 and 15 per cent bigger and twice as fat as drug-free mice.
This affirms research from Copenhagen which found that infants given antibiotics within the first six months of life were more likely to be overweight at age 7, even if their mother was of a healthy weight.

Read more: http://www.anh-usa.org/antibiotics-may-be-contributing-to-the-obesity-epidemic/