Biology pathogenic bacteria. Types of pathogenic bacteria. Diagnosis of bacterial infections

Their sizes are from 0.1 to 30 microns.

Microbes are extremely common. They live in soil, air, water, snow and even hot springs, on the body of animals, as well as inside living organisms, including the human body.

Main types of bacteria

The distribution of bacteria into species is based on several criteria, among which the shape of microorganisms and their spatial distribution are most often taken into account. So, according to the form they are divided into:

Coci - micro-, diplo-, strepto-, staphylococci, as well as sarcins;

Rod-shaped - monobacteria, diplobacteria and streptobacteria;

Convoluted species - vibrios and spirochetes.

Also includes the condition of the bacterial wall:

1. gram-positive bacteria with a thin cell wall - myxobacteria, photosynthetic forms of microorganisms that release oxygen (cyanobacteria);

2. gram-positive bacteria from the colon (clostridia and actinomycetes);

3. which do not have a cell wall (mycoplasma);

4. bacteria that have an inferior cell wall - in this group microorganisms include ancient forms capable of producing methane.

Consider the most common pathogenic bacteria that affect humans.

Vibrio Koch - causes cholera. Infection with these microorganisms occurs through water, food, dirty hands and items contaminated with vibrios. The source of the spread of the disease are patients and carriers in whom cholera does not develop, but who spread pathogenic microbes among other people;

Bacillus Sonne and Flexner - causes the development of dysentery, spreads among the population in the same ways as the previous microorganism;

Bacillus Koch - is the causative agent of tuberculosis. It is transmitted to other people from sick people through the air and droplets released from the cough of infected people;

Bacillus clostridium tetanus - causes a serious illness - tetanus. Infection occurs through contact with soil contaminated with clostridia, as well as through transmission pathogenic microorganisms from a sick animal or person;

Yersinia pestis - the causative agent of plague, causes not only bubonic form diseases, but also severe lung damage;

Mycobacterium leprosy - causes the development of leprosy, which is popularly called leprosy and is characterized by damage to the skin and mucous membranes, peripheral nervous system;

Corynebacterium diphtheria - microorganisms that cause diphtheria - severe pathology, which is characterized by damage to the mucous membranes of the oropharynx with the formation of fibrous films, intoxication, damage to the heart, nervous system and kidneys;

Pale treponema - is the causative agent of syphilis, which is a sexually transmitted pathology and causes damage to the skin, mucous membranes, internal organs, bones, as well as the nervous system;

Helicobacter pylori is a microorganism that causes the development of peptic ulcer.

Pathogenic bacteria can cause many other serious illnesses with damage to various organs that require appropriate treatment. c

Pathogenic bacteria can cause a systemic inflammatory response of the body, severe pneumonia, meningitis, and even sepsis with the development of shock, which leads to death, so it is important to prevent pathogenic flora into the body. For this purpose, apply various methods antiseptics and disinfectants.

In the 17th century Dutch scientist Anthony van Leeuwenhoek discovered the world of invisible beings with the help of a microscope made by himself. But for a long time after this remarkable discovery, it never occurred to anyone to connect the existence of negligibly small creatures - microbes - with infectious diseases. Knowledge about diseases, about the causes of epidemics and measures to combat them, accumulated slowly and gradually. One of the founders of the science of microbes (microbiology) was the great French scientist Louis Pasteur. He and the German scientist Robert Koch late XIX in. developed methods for culture of bacteria and sterilization of media. Pasteur discovered the scientific methods of protective vaccinations, and Koch discovered the causative agent of tuberculosis and cholera. The Russian scientist I. I. Mechnikov made a huge contribution to the doctrine of immunity in animals and humans.

There are many microbes in our body: in the mouth and nose, in the pharynx, in the intestines. Tooth decay is the result harmful action microbes. The large intestines are a breeding ground putrefactive bacteria. According to the teachings of I. I. Mechnikov, they poison us slowly but steadily, contributing to premature old age. Mechnikov advised eating curdled milk and thus colonizing the intestines with lactic acid bacteria. Later it was found out that beneficial action lactic acid bacteria of curdled milk for a short time. They do not take root well in the human intestine. Much better take root lactic acid bacteria belonging to the type of acidophilus bacillus contained in acidophilus.

were vaccinated with smallpox vaccine according to the method of Dr. Jenner. On this occasion, there were many all sorts of ridiculous things that after inoculation of "cow" smallpox, horns grow in people, etc. The caricature of that time ridicules these rumors.

Of the microbes living in the intestines, not only lactic acid bacteria are useful. Some microbes have a beneficial effect on the body, enriching it with vitamins. The presence of bacteria in the veins, arteries, lungs, kidneys, or other internal cavities the human or animal body is definitely harmful. Pathogenic microbes have adapted to exist in living tissue. Having penetrated the body, they begin to multiply there. This is how an infectious disease occurs. If a disease that is transmitted from one person to another causes the disease of many people, then this is already epidemic. Mass infectious diseases among animals are called epizootics, and among plants epiphytoties.

Such intestinal diseases like cholera, dysentery, typhoid fever, a person becomes infected not only directly from the sick person. The causative agents of these diseases can get from a sick person in one way or another into water or food. Therefore, in our country there is a strict medical supervision of water and food products.

Between microbes different types hostile relations exist. One of the episodes of the struggle of microbes is filmed here. white spot on the surface of the nutrient jelly, it is a colony of microbes that release substances that are harmful to other microbes. Around this speck is a death zone. Colonies of other microbes grew only at a respectful distance from the spot.

At waterworks, water is first sent to sedimentation tanks, and then passed through filters made of pebbles and sand. To destroy microbes, water is chlorinated or treated with ultraviolet rays.

Vibrio cholerae persists in the soil for about 25 days, and typhoid bacillus - up to 3 months. Bacillus spores anthrax, once in favorable conditions, do not die in the soil for years. One of the most dangerous microbes - the causative agent of tetanus - sometimes nests in manure-fertilized soil. If several of its bacilli get into a wound or scratch along with contamination, then the person is threatened with painful death. Only a timely tetanus toxoid vaccination can save him.

Many insects and rodents are involved in the spread of some contagious diseases (see the article “Insects and ticks - keepers and carriers of pathogens”). Diseases are transmitted to humans and from animals. In areas where livestock is sick with tuberculosis and brucellosis, the causative agents of these diseases can spread to people through raw milk. The person himself can unwittingly take part in the spread of contagious diseases. A patient with dysentery, typhoid fever, diphtheria, tuberculosis, at the slightest negligence, becomes a distributor of the disease.

You can get infected from healthy person. It happens like this: a person fell ill with typhoid fever, recovered, but typhoid bacteria still remained somewhere in his body. From time to time they stand out, and a healthy person becomes an unwitting sower of infection - a bacillus carrier.

In the history of human society, there have been many epidemics of plague, cholera, typhus, and smallpox. It happened, and more than once, especially in the old days, that almost the entire population of the country died out from plague epidemics. The question may arise: why, at that time, when people were still helpless in the fight against the destructive microbial elements, the whole human race did not perish? One of the essential reasons for this lies in the following happy circumstance, which science later established. It turns out that in the body of a person who has had an infectious disease, special protective substances arise and immunity, t . e. immunity to this disease. Immunity to any infectious disease also depends on the so-called innate immunity.

In cases where these protective properties are insufficient, it is possible to force the body to produce these protective substances without exposing the person or animal to disease. To do this, it is enough to introduce into his body dead pathogenic bacteria or live, but greatly weakened. With even greater success, microbes can be used for this, the properties of which artificial way changed.

From killed or modified crops - pathogens of cholera, plague, typhoid fever, dysentery, tularemia - prepare wonderful protective drugs - vaccines. The method of application of vaccines is especially fruitful.

The body acquires immunity only a few days after the vaccine is introduced into it. But for some infectious diseases, it is necessary immediate help. In such cases, apply healing serum, obtained from the blood of an animal, in which, after the introduction of pathogenic microbes, antibodies are formed - special substances that suppress the activity of the pathogen.

In 1871-1872. Russian scientists A. G. Polotebnov and V. A. Manassein published studies on healing properties mold. In 1929, the English bacteriologist A. Fleming isolated yellow microscopic crystals from the mycelium of a special mold, penicilla. The substance consisting of these crystals was named penicillin. Penicillin promotes rapid healing festering ulcers and wounds. Penicillin successfully treats pneumonia and other human diseases, complications after injury, various diseases pets.

Substances that protect against invisible enemies are released not only by penicillium mold. Various microorganisms, in particular actinomycetes, produce substances that inhibit and even destroy harmful microbes without harming the patient's body. Such healing substances got common name antibiotics. A wonderful first-aid kit of antibiotics is constantly replenished.

Antibiotic treatment of food - fish, meat, fruit - protects them from spoilage. Despite numerous studies on the microbiology of water bodies, silts, soils, and rocks, our information on free-living microflora is still incomplete and contradictory. The world of microbes is too diverse, and many of them are very demanding on the conditions of their existence. By using light microscope calculated the number of microorganisms taken from the sludge of Lake Kolomenskoye: 1 g of raw sludge contained 205,000,000 microbes. ( Electron microscope allows you to detect 10-100 times more germs.) When they tried to sow these microbes on a nutrient medium, only 300 of them survived, that is, 735 thousand times less.

A radical improvement in the methods for detecting and studying microorganisms was proposed in the work of B.V. Perfilyev and D.R. Gabe, for which the authors were awarded the Lenin Prize in 1964. B.V. with the natural substrate slowly flowing into them, we will be able to “trick” even the most fastidious microbes and they will develop in these glass systems “at home”. With the help of amazing glass technology, the most various designs capillaries with flat walls. It became possible to grow micro-organisms in what is called "keeping an eye on them" at very high magnifications of the microscope. The capillary technique has led to the discovery of many new microorganisms, and the list is constantly growing.

It is difficult to find such a point on our planet, where there would be no microorganisms. They actively participated in grandiose geological transformations. Huge underground accumulations of combustible gas in Uzbekistan, countless, oil deposits in Tataria, oil shale in Estonia, coal beds, peat layers, underwater combustible sapropels, deposits of sulfur, saltpeter, iron treasures - all this is the result of the activity of the smallest living beings. The geography of microbes is very instructive and fascinating. They are found at a depth of 10-11 thousand meters under the oceanic waters and in the air ocean at an altitude of over 20 km.

Well, what about higher? Immeasurably higher - in the astronomical distances of space? Are there really any simple creatures on Mars, Venus, anywhere else besides our densely populated planet? Many scientists of the XIX and early XX centuries. interested in these issues. In our time of space flights, this issue has acquired a special topicality. It can be considered probable that due to the pressure of light, the smallest, dried, but viable microorganisms move into outer space on the long distances, overcoming the barriers of ultraviolet radiation, zones of high and low temperatures. But before allowing microbes to travel, one must know whether they exist on other planets. This is one of the problems that space biology solves.

The word "bacteria" in most people is associated with something unpleasant and a threat to health. AT best case are remembered dairy products. At worst - dysbacteriosis, plague, dysentery and other troubles. Bacteria are everywhere, good and bad. What can microorganisms hide?

What is bacteria

Bacteria in Greek means "stick". This name does not mean that harmful bacteria are meant.

This name was given to them because of the shape. Most of these single cells look like rods. They also come in squares, stellate cells. For a billion years, bacteria do not change their external appearance, they can only change internally. They can be mobile and immobile. Bacteria on the outside it's covered thin shell. This allows her to keep her shape. Inside the cell there is no nucleus, chlorophyll. There are ribosomes, vacuoles, outgrowths of the cytoplasm, protoplasm. The largest bacterium was found in 1999. It was called the "Gray Pearl of Namibia". Bacteria and bacillus mean the same thing, only they have a different origin.

Man and bacteria

In our body, there is a constant struggle between harmful and beneficial bacteria. Through this process, a person receives protection from various infections. Various microorganisms surround us at every step. They live on clothes, they fly in the air, they are omnipresent.

The presence of bacteria in the mouth, and this is about forty thousand microorganisms, protects the gums from bleeding, from periodontal disease and even from tonsillitis. If a woman's microflora is disturbed, she may begin gynecological diseases. Compliance elementary rules personal hygiene will help to avoid such failures.

Human immunity depends entirely on the state of the microflora. Only in gastrointestinal tract contains almost 60% of all bacteria. The rest are located in respiratory system and in the sex. About two kilograms of bacteria live in a person.

The appearance of bacteria in the body

A newly born baby has a sterile intestine.

After his first breath, many microorganisms enter the body, with which he was not previously familiar. When the baby is first attached to the breast, the mother transfers beneficial bacteria with milk that will help normalize the intestinal microflora. No wonder doctors insist that the mother immediately after the birth of her child breastfeed him. They also recommend extending such feeding as long as possible.

Beneficial bacteria

Beneficial bacteria are: lactic acid, bifidobacteria, coli, streptomycents, mycorrhiza, cyanobacteria.

They all play important role In human life. Some of them prevent the occurrence of infections, others are used in production. medicines, others maintain a balance in the ecosystem of our planet.

Types of harmful bacteria

Harmful bacteria can cause a number of serious illnesses. For example, diphtheria, tonsillitis, plague and many others. They are easily transmitted from an infected person through air, food, touch. It is the harmful bacteria, whose names will be given below, that spoil food. From them comes bad smell, rotting and decomposition occurs, they cause disease.

Bacteria can be gram-positive, gram-negative, rod-shaped.

Names of harmful bacteria

Table. Harmful bacteria for humans. Titles
TitlesHabitatHarm
Mycobacteriafood, watertuberculosis, leprosy, ulcer
tetanus bacillussoil, skin, digestive tracttetanus, muscle spasms, respiratory failure

Plague wand

(considered by experts as a biological weapon)

only in humans, rodents and mammalsbubonic plague, pneumonia, skin infections
Helicobacter pylorihuman stomach lininggastritis, peptic ulcer, produces cytotoxins, ammonia
anthrax bacillusthe soilanthrax
botulism stickfood, contaminated dishespoisoning

Harmful bacteria can for a long time stay in the body and absorb useful material out of him. However, they can cause an infectious disease.

The most dangerous bacteria

One of the most resistant bacteria is methicillin. It is better known under the name " Staphylococcus aureus» ( Staphylococcus aureus). can cause not one, but several infectious diseases. Some of these bacteria are resistant to powerful antibiotics and antiseptics. Strains of this bacterium can live in upper divisions respiratory tract, in open wounds and urinary canals of every third inhabitant of the Earth. For a person with strong immunity it poses no danger.

Harmful bacteria to humans are also pathogens called Salmonella typhi. They are stimulants acute infection intestines and typhoid fever. These types of bacteria that are harmful to humans are dangerous because they produce toxic substances which are extremely life threatening. During the course of the disease, intoxication of the body occurs, very high fever, rashes on the body, enlarged liver and spleen. The bacterium is highly resistant to various external influences. It lives well in water, on vegetables, fruits and reproduces well in milk products.

To the most dangerous bacteria also includes the bacterium Clostridium tetan. It produces a poison called tetanus exotoxin. People who become infected with this pathogen experience terrible pain, convulsions and die very hard. The disease is called tetanus. Despite the fact that the vaccine was created back in 1890, every year on Earth 60 thousand people die from it.

And another bacterium that can lead to the death of a person is It causes tuberculosis, which is resistant to drugs. At untimely appeal for help, a person can die.

Measures to prevent the spread of infections

Harmful bacteria, the names of microorganisms are studied from the student bench by physicians of all directions. Every year, healthcare is looking for new methods to prevent the spread of infections that are dangerous to human life. With the observance of preventive measures, you will not have to waste your energy on finding new ways to deal with such diseases.

To do this, it is necessary to identify the source of the infection in time, determine the circle of the sick and possible victims. It is imperative to isolate those who are infected and disinfect the source of infection.

The second stage is the destruction of the ways through which harmful bacteria can be transmitted. To do this, carry out appropriate propaganda among the population.

Food facilities, reservoirs, warehouses with food storage are taken under control.

Every man can resist harmful bacteria by strengthening your immune system. healthy image life, observance of elementary rules of hygiene, protection of oneself during sexual contact, use of sterile disposable medical instruments and equipment, complete restriction from communication with people in quarantine. When entering the epidemiological region or the focus of infection, it is necessary to strictly comply with all the requirements of the sanitary and epidemiological services. A number of infections are equated in their impact to bacteriological weapons.

Bacteria are the oldest inhabitants of our planet. They managed to adapt to almost everything possible conditions life. Bacteria have existed on Earth for billions of years. They are widely distributed throughout the planet and are present in all its ecosystems. In the article we will address the question of what diseases cause pathogenic bacteria. The habitat of these organisms will also be considered by us.

evolution of bacteria

Their first representatives appeared more than 3.5 billion years ago. For almost a billion years, these organisms remained the only living creatures on Earth.

At first, bacteria had a primitive structure. Then it became more complicated, but even now these organisms are the most primitive unicellular. It is interesting that in our time, some bacteria have retained the features characteristic of their ancestors. This applies to organisms living in hot sulfur springs, as well as living at the bottom of reservoirs (in oxygen-free silts).

soil bacteria

Soil organisms are the most numerous group of bacteria. Their form is ideally adapted to the existence in the conditions that they prefer. In the course of evolution, it practically did not change. In shape, they can resemble a stick, a ball. They may also be curved. These organisms are mostly chemosynthetic. In other words, they receive energy as a result of special redox reactions that occur with the participation of carbon dioxide(carbon dioxide). As a result of this process, these organisms synthesize substances that other species use for life.

Types of bacteria in the soil

Fertile soil has a rich and varied bacterial composition. Among its inhabitants stand out:

  • nitrogen-fixing organisms;
  • pathogenic bacteria whose habitat is the soil;
  • lactic acid bacteria, butyric acid bacteria);
  • microorganisms that reduce heavy metals.

Among them, not all are dangerous to plants or animals. Many, on the contrary, are useful. They play an important role in nature. However, pathogenic bacteria are also found in the soil. Their habitat contributes to the fact that it is plants that mainly suffer from them.

Prevention of the appearance of pathogenic bacteria in the soil

If you carefully handle the soil, periodically alternate the crops grown on it, it will cope with toxic substances on its own. For example, toxic substances always appear during decay and decay of roots, stems and leaves. However, on healthy soil, this process will proceed naturally; pathogenic plant bacteria will not multiply in it. The problem appears if the amount of plant mass that requires processing increases sharply. Therefore, it is necessary to cut off excess branches, uproot trees, remove and cut shrubs, remove all chips, roots and twigs from the site.

Fight against pathogenic soil bacteria

If you find that only one type of plant is sick all the time on your site, you do not need to spray the affected leaves and stems from year to year. The fact is that the harmful source lives in the soil. Therefore, seeds should be protected from infection. Then the plants that emerge from them will be healthy.

Potassium permanganate diluted in water is the most a simple means fight bacteria. It should be diluted in water at the rate of 1 g per 100 ml of water. Next, soak the seeds in it for half an hour, then rinse them thoroughly with water. Another remedy is to dissolve in a liter of water 1 gram of potassium permanganate crystals and " blue stone" (blue vitriol) and add 0.2 g of boric acid.

Pathogenic bacteria in the human body

The most common habitat for them is the saliva of a sick person, as well as dishes and other items used by the patient. They can also enter the body through stagnant indoor air. Pathogenic bacteria are found in water, food and almost all surfaces. They are especially favorable unsanitary conditions. It is also possible to get infected from sick animals, since some types of these bacteria, which are dangerous for them, can also harm us.

And plants, as we have said, can infect pathogenic bacteria. Their habitat includes, in particular, the fruits of plants. Visually, the fetus affected by them can be easily identified. Therefore, one should be attentive to vegetables and fruits used for food, especially wild ones. After all, pathogenic bacteria are organisms that cause dangerous diseases. Compliance with personal hygiene, as well as airing the premises, is the best prevention.

coli

Pathogenic bacteria whose habitat is - human body, are numerous. Take, for example, E. coli. It is a symbiont bacterium, the source nutrients for which the body of warm-blooded animals serves. Mostly Escherichia coli has a rod-shaped form. It lives mainly in the lower part of the intestinal cavity. However, E. coli can also be found in foods, in water. In addition, it is able to survive for some time in the environment.

There are many varieties (strains) of this type of bacteria. Most of them are harmless. These organisms are present in normal intestinal flora both animals and humans. A temperature of 37 ° C is optimal for them.

One version says that E. coli enters the human body within 40 hours after its birth, and lives in it throughout a person's life. The source of its entry into the body can be mother's milk or people in contact with the child. According to another version, this bacterium inhabits the body even in the mother's womb.

E. coli is harmless in its usual habitat conditions. However, it can become pathogenic if it ends up in other parts of our body. In addition, its disease-causing strains can penetrate from the outside. As a result, a person has various gastrointestinal infections.

streptococci

Staphylococci

From birth, a person begins contact with an infection caused by staphylococcus aureus. The body develops a strong immunity to it throughout life. Under the influence of a number of factors, these bacteria turn into pathogens. They affect the skin, and there are barley, pyoderma, abscesses, boils and carbuncles. The spread of infection leads to folliculitis, cellulitis, soft tissue phlegmon, abscesses, mastitis and hydradenitis.

Staphylococcus enters the body through the bloodstream. It causes diseases of the heart (endocarditis and pericarditis), bones (osteomyelitis), joints (bacterial arthritis), urinary system, brain, lower and upper respiratory tract. Almost all human tissues and organs can affect staph infection. There are more than a hundred types of diseases that it causes. Enterotoxins of staphylococci, getting into the gastrointestinal tract with food, lead to food poisoning(toxic infections).

Children under one year of age, as well as immunocompromised adults, are the most prone to infection. The manifestations of lesions vary. They depend on the place of introduction of staphylococcus into the body, on the degree of its aggressiveness, as well as on the state of the patient's immunity.

tuberculosis bacillus

A person who becomes infected with a tubercle bacillus becomes ill with tuberculosis. At the same time, small tubercles appear in the bones, kidneys, lungs, as well as some other organs, which eventually disintegrate. tuberculosis is very dangerous disease, which sometimes takes years to fight.

plague wand

Plague wands are also bacteria, disease-causing. Infection with them leads to the appearance of an even more severe and one of the most transient diseases - the plague. Sometimes from the first signs of infection to lethal outcome only a few hours pass. In ancient times, devastating epidemics of this disease were a terrible disaster. There were cases when entire villages and even cities died out from them.

Other habitats for pathogenic bacteria

Bacteria can choose for life not only those places that were discussed above. Some of them exist in conditions that seem unsuitable for life. These are hot springs and polar ice, and and strong pressure. The fight against pathogenic bacteria is relevant everywhere. After all, there is no place on Earth where they could not be found.

So, we talked about which bacteria are pathogenic and where they live. Of course, this article describes only their main representatives. Kinds pathogenic bacteria, as you know, are numerous, so acquaintance with them can last a very long time.

Bacteria cause typhus, cholera, diphtheria, tetanus, tuberculosis, tonsillitis, meningitis, glanders, anthrax, brucellosis and other diseases. One of these diseases a person can become infected when communicating with the patient through the smallest droplets of saliva when talking, coughing and sneezing, others - when eating food or water, which got pathogenic bacteria.

Unsanitary conditions, dirt, large crowding of people, non-compliance with the rules of personal hygiene create favorable conditions for the rapid reproduction and spread of pathogenic bacteria. This can cause an epidemic, i.e. mass disease of people.

Tuberculosis bacillus in the lungs

When infected tuberculosis bacillus a person gets sick tuberculosis: in the lungs, kidneys, bones and some other organs, small tubercles develop, prone to decay. Tuberculosis is a disease that can last for years.

Plague- one of the most serious diseases - is caused by plague sticks. If too many people get sick, an epidemic breaks out. The devastating plague epidemics in antiquity were the most terrible disaster. For example, in the VI century. the plague entered from the East Central Europe. Rampant there, the disease exterminated thousands of people a day in large cities. The history of human society knows many epidemics like this epidemic of the plague.

In areas where livestock suffers from brucellosis, the causative agents of this disease enter the human body along with raw milk and a person can get sick. Infectious diseases are also transmitted through the smallest droplets of saliva when talking, coughing and sneezing the patient.

At a time when people didn't know anything about bacteria, the emergence of epidemics of plague, typhoid, cholera was explained by the "punishment of God" for sins. In the old days, the spread of pathogenic bacteria was favored by various religious rites (baptism, communion, kissing the cross and icons), which took place in unsanitary conditions.

Currently, special measures are being taken to prevent and reduce the number of contagious diseases. Preventive vaccinations are given in kindergartens, schools, and enterprises. Strict medical control over water sources and food products has been stopped. At waterworks, water is purified in special sedimentation tanks, passed through a filter, and chlorinated.

anthrax bacterium

Patients receive drugs that kill disease-causing bacteria. To destroy bacteria in the room where the infectious patient is located, disinfection is carried out, that is, spraying or fumigation chemicals causing bacteria to die.

Opportunistic (not always dangerous) microbes

The collection of microorganisms that live in the gastrointestinal tract oral cavity, urinary tract and on human skin, called the microflora. This combination, along with useful ones, also includes harmful (pathogenic) bacteria. The harm or benefit caused depends on the number of pathogenic microbes in the human body.

For example, E. coli is an integral part of the microflora, but in the presence favorable conditions it actively multiplies, releasing toxins that poison the body. The result is inflammatory processes in the intestines, kidneys, bladder and other troubles.

"Dual-faced" cells that behave in this way are called opportunistic pathogens. Streptococci, which make up almost half of the inhabitants of the oral cavity, also belong to this category. Warm and humid "climate", the presence of large food supplies play into the hands of dangerous microbes. They settle along the entire length of the gastrointestinal tract, respiratory tract, but most a large number of streptococci lives on the surface of the skin. The results of their actions are:

  • pustular diseases (boils, abscesses);
  • sore throats;
  • bronchitis;
  • rheumatism;
  • in a weakened body, even toxic shock is possible.

The attack of streptococci on the cells of the body does not go unnoticed by the immune system. But there is another danger here. strep infection causes an autoimmune response, i.e., the immune system perceives its own tissues as foreign and begins to fight them. The consequence may be serious illness heart, joints, kidneys.

Pathogenic bacteria of the Streptococcus family are responsible for:

  • pneumonia, sepsis, meningitis in newborns;
  • sepsis, mastitis, meningitis in parturients;
  • peritonitis;
  • caries (streptococcus ferments lactic acid, corroding tooth enamel).

However, not only fungi and streptococci constantly live in the oral cavity. Their neighbors are no less dangerous:

  • pneumococci (bronchitis, pneumonia, pleurisy, middle ear disease, sinusitis);
  • gingivalis bacteria (the main cause of periodontitis);
  • treponema dentikola (periodontal disease).

These bacteria affect teeth and human health. To prevent such a precedent, you can only timely brush your teeth and wash your hands. It will be much more difficult to treat neglected diseases.

Opportunistic microbes living on the skin

Normally present on the skin of a healthy person great amount useful and dangerous single-celled and various fungi. These microorganisms love "tropical" conditions. A warm and humid environment in the folds of the skin plus a lot of dead cells for nutrition - ideal conditions existence of skin bacteria. By the way, it is these tiny creatures that are responsible for all the unpleasant odors of our body. With a strong immune system and personal hygiene, these fungi and microbes are not dangerous to human health. Soap, water, healthy food– and many problems can be avoided.

The following pathogenic bacteria constantly live on the skin:

  1. Streptococci. Reduce immunity, contributing to the occurrence of serious infectious diseases. Cause chronic tonsillitis, erysipelas, severe poisoning with toxins.
  2. Staphylococci. With reduced immunity, they cause skin lesions - barley, boils, abscesses, carbuncles. If it enters the bloodstream, it can cause problems with bones, joints, heart, respiratory tract, brain, urinary system. In the gastrointestinal tract, the spread of staphylococci provokes enteritis and colitis.

deadly bacteria

In addition to conditionally pathogenic, there are really dangerous pathogenic bacteria that are not included in normal microflora person. These include the causative agents of typhoid, cholera, diphtheria, tetanus, tuberculosis, anthrax, etc. Quite a lot a small amount dangerous microorganisms in order to make a person sick.

The most powerful are toxins secreted by tetanus and diphtheria bacilli, streptococci and staphylococci. These disease-causing bacteria release poison in the process of life, but there are other options. tuberculosis bacillus, the causative agents of cholera and anthrax, pneumococci manage to poison our existence and after their death - decomposing, they release the strongest toxins.

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