We all have to admit to the many advances in our health care we can be thankful for today. Prior to the 1900's the top related causes of death were due largely to contaminated food and water as well as an insufficient housing and sewage disposal system. Once we began to understand more about the invisible world full of bacteria, things like indoor plumbing and the sterilization of medical instruments were established. With the passage of time, we have become more and more conscience about our personal hygiene. The results are a wonderful decrease in infectious diseases.

However, while there has been a significant decrease in deaths due to infectious diseases, starting with the introduction of penicillin in the 1940's, new issues within the disease related causes of death cropped up. The causes of death went from infectious diseases to chronic disease conditions. People are not dying from poor hygiene, they are dying from the decrease and elimination of something else.

And this is where our discussion turns to the endangered internal species as a result of antibiotics. The sad truth of this problem is - what kills the disease carrying bacteria, also kills our wonderful probiotic bacteria friends.

While antibiotics have attributed to the elimination of so many diseases, the constant abuse of these medications, which includes prescribing them when people have colds and flues, which are virus related, not bacterial. Virus related illnesses are those that antibiotics cannot help. So, while sick with something non-bacterial you are killing off your bodies means of keeping it's immune system in top condition, which only leads to being more susceptible to other illnesses.

In addition to this people have added to the development of the super resistant bacteria due to the lack of following through with their dosage of their medications properly. This has created a cycle that keeps getting worse. Drug companies continue to manufacture and develop stronger antibiotics and the abuses such as mentioned above continue to happen. It is a never ending cycle that is become quite frightening when you dig deeper into the consequences.

So, where does this leave us? What is the solution?

It is not a secret that both bad and good bacteria are destroyed when taking these medications. If doctors know that antibiotics destroy our healthy flora, how come they don't follow up their prescriptions with probiotics?

Although antibiotics have really reeked havoc on good bacterial growth, we have added to their damage by our more modern lifestyles. Fast food, soda, diet products, processed foods and the total lack of eating well-balanced meals are also to blame. We are living in a world of convenience which is running at a very fast pace. This causes a great deal of stress, lack of proper amounts of sleep, emotional distress and so forth. Our bodies are simply bombarded day in and day out. Our factory of health is exhausted. And we have only ourselves to blame.

How do we prevent our good bacteria from becoming part of an internal extinct species? The answer is simple.

Helping our intestinal tract is just a matter of introducing the probiotics our bodies have lost and continue to lose daily. We can do this by adding into our diets the fruits, vegetables, yogurts and other foods that contain a wide variety of probiotics. We can also add them by way of probiotic powders, probiotic liquids and probiotic supplements. In the next article I'll be talking about some of the more common foods that we can buy to encourage our healthy probiotic bacteria to grow and outnumber the bad bacteria.

For more articles by Kimberly Shannon on probiotic supplements and how they help our immune system, visit getbreastcancersupport.com