• Question: How do you kill bacteria?

    Asked by anon-193422 to Emma, Morwenna, Jamal, iainstaniland, Heidi, Carl on 11 Nov 2018. This question was also asked by anon-193530.
    • Photo: Emma Crawford

      Emma Crawford answered on 11 Nov 2018:

      So there are lots of different types of bacteria and depending what the bacteria is and where it is found can require different ways to kill it. For example, bacteria found in food is best killed by cooking it fully at a temperature where bacteria can no longer live. Bacteria found in the body can be killed using antibiotics – however not all bacteria is bad and we need certain good bacteria in our body to survive. Around the house the most common way to kill bacteria in general is using a disinfectant spray.

    • Photo: Heidi Gardner

      Heidi Gardner answered on 13 Nov 2018:

      Making sure that you’ve killed all of the bad bacteria is one of the most important things in the medical world right now. If you have a bacterial infection then your doctor will prescribe you with antibiotic medication that can kill them – there are lots of different types of antibiotics, and some bacteria can be more easily killed with some medicines rather than others. Your doctor would prescribe the most effective antibiotic so that the bacteria are all killed. If they aren’t all killed (like maybe if you don’t take all of the medicine they give you), the bacteria can actually become immune to the medication, so it doesn’t work anyway. That’s how we get antibiotic resistance, and that’s really dangerous. As Emma said in her answer, not all bacteria are bad – your gut is filled with good bacteria that help to keep us healthy! It’s important that we eat a balanced diet to keep that bacteria happy too 🙂

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