Why do babies need probiotics?
The quality and diversity of the bacteria, both “good” or beneficial and less-than-beneficial or “bad,” are largely determined by mum’s microflora. A fetus gets his or her gut bacteria from mum during gestation, delivery, and through skin contact and breast feeding.
A newborn’s gut lining is permeable and can allow “foreign” materials to pass through into the bloodstream, increasing the potential for an allergic response. When a baby is breastfed, mum’s first milk or colostrum helps form a protective barrier on this mucousal lining. This protective barrier also serves as a breeding ground for beneficial microbes that help provide additional reinforcement. A mum’s gut flora is influenced by many factors, including the father’s microbiome. And either parent’s gut flora can be adversely affected by a number of things, such as processed or sugary foods, processed foods with bio engineered ingredients, pollution, antibiotics, heartburn pills, pesticides in foods, chlorinated and fluoridated water, and even stress.
Why give your baby probiotics:
Influences your child’s metabolism and weight
May help reduce potential adverse side effects from childhood vaccinations
Support brain health and development
Helps digest food and produce certain nutrients
Helps support urinary tract health and vaginal health
Recent research reveals that leafy green vegetables contain a certain type of sugar that actually feeds beneficial gut bacteria.
So, in a nutshell, if you are planning on having a baby, eat fermented vegetables, make yogurt or kefir from raw milk, take a multi strain probiotic from a Naturopath or CBM office.
When the baby is born, breastfeed it and give the baby a probiotic and small amounts of juice from the fermented vegetables to prime the immune system and prevent illness and allergies.
