A Canadian woman is being tried for the entirely preventable death of her 7-year-old from strep throat. Since I read that piece of news, two different mothers started crowing in my Facebook mommy groups about how great they are for not starting their children on the antibiotics, relying on herbal and folk remedies instead.
The first case involved a suspected ear infection. The doctor indicated that she believed an ear infection was developing, but that it was too early to tell and offered antibiotics as a preventative measure. The mother said she would rather not give antibiotics, and the doctor acceded on the condition that they return in three days to see if the redness was clearing up. It had gotten better, so antibiotics were not needed. The mother attributed this to her careful winter regimen of vitamins and herbal supplements. She also believes that this is a typical case of antibiotics being overprescribed, rather than a demonstration of her being wealthy enough to take off an additional day from work on short notice to track the development of the suspected infection.
The second case involved pink-eye contracted at daycare. The doctor prescribed an antibiotic ointment. The mother said she'd rather not. The doctor insisted that she use it if the eye wasn't getting better alone within 24 hours. At the end of the day, there was clearly no improvement, so the mother crowd-sourced for potential remedies, even though, by her own admission, she knew the ointment is safe. Her argument was that the pharmaceutical companies have us tricked into believing that our bodies cannot heal themselves, and she would rather her son's body learn to deal with such infections instead of relying on antibiotics. It was pointed out to her that the immune system doesn't work like that and that eye infections can easily cause irreversible vision damage that cannot be fixed with glasses. She accused the objectors of derailing the conversation.
I know that overuse of antibiotics is an issue. When people don't use antibiotics as prescribed, or when doctors proscribe them for viruses, it leads to an increase in antibiotic resistant bacteria. Furthermore, antibiotics are hardly benign, often causing digestive issues. It makes sense to question the doctor on why antibiotics are being proscribed.
What I don't get is how the parents in the above examples can be so cavalier with their children's health. In the US in 1900, the top three causes of death were infectious diseases (pneumonia, tuberculosis, and diarrhea/enteritis). Of these, 40% were in children under 5. And that doesn't even count all the children who suffered permanent damage to their hearing, vision (Helen Keller, anyone?), and lungs before they successfully fought off the infection.
The first case involved a suspected ear infection. The doctor indicated that she believed an ear infection was developing, but that it was too early to tell and offered antibiotics as a preventative measure. The mother said she would rather not give antibiotics, and the doctor acceded on the condition that they return in three days to see if the redness was clearing up. It had gotten better, so antibiotics were not needed. The mother attributed this to her careful winter regimen of vitamins and herbal supplements. She also believes that this is a typical case of antibiotics being overprescribed, rather than a demonstration of her being wealthy enough to take off an additional day from work on short notice to track the development of the suspected infection.
The second case involved pink-eye contracted at daycare. The doctor prescribed an antibiotic ointment. The mother said she'd rather not. The doctor insisted that she use it if the eye wasn't getting better alone within 24 hours. At the end of the day, there was clearly no improvement, so the mother crowd-sourced for potential remedies, even though, by her own admission, she knew the ointment is safe. Her argument was that the pharmaceutical companies have us tricked into believing that our bodies cannot heal themselves, and she would rather her son's body learn to deal with such infections instead of relying on antibiotics. It was pointed out to her that the immune system doesn't work like that and that eye infections can easily cause irreversible vision damage that cannot be fixed with glasses. She accused the objectors of derailing the conversation.
I know that overuse of antibiotics is an issue. When people don't use antibiotics as prescribed, or when doctors proscribe them for viruses, it leads to an increase in antibiotic resistant bacteria. Furthermore, antibiotics are hardly benign, often causing digestive issues. It makes sense to question the doctor on why antibiotics are being proscribed.
What I don't get is how the parents in the above examples can be so cavalier with their children's health. In the US in 1900, the top three causes of death were infectious diseases (pneumonia, tuberculosis, and diarrhea/enteritis). Of these, 40% were in children under 5. And that doesn't even count all the children who suffered permanent damage to their hearing, vision (Helen Keller, anyone?), and lungs before they successfully fought off the infection.
