Difference between Good and Bad Bacteria

Key Difference: Good bacteria resides almost everywhere on the body including on the skin, inside the mouth, stomach, intestines, etc. The basic job of good bacteria is to fight off bad bacteria and keep it from entering the system. Bad bacteria are known as bad for a reason, as it intends to harm the human system. These bacteria are responsible for damaging the internal functions, causing the body to spin out of balance. Bad bacteria cause viruses, illness and can even cause death.

 The human body is a complex system which relies on a lot of things for existence. The life is a cycle, hence known as a life cycle, of things that rely on others for basic needs. For example: humans rely on animals and plants, animals rely on plants, these plants rely on nutrients from the earth, the earth receives nutrients from decomposing organic matter (such as humans) and so on. Everything relies on something else for continuing the life cycle. Similarly, we have a give and take nature with bacteria, they cannot survive without humans and humans cannot survive without bacteria.

Many people hear the word bacteria and often believe it to the disease spreading germs that result in the death of the inhabitant; however, this is not the only kind of bacteria that exists. There are actually two different kinds of bacteria: good bacteria and bad bacteria. These bacteria are present in a balance in the body. If the balance is disrupted on either side, the body becomes sick or ill and acts out. Each type of bacteria is also responsible for different types of activities in the body.

Bacteria are single-celled organisms that fall under the prokaryotes classification. While, we are multi-cellular creatures, bacteria are single-cells which include a cell wall and a plasma membrane. These are microscopic and are not visible to the naked eye. Bacteria have no internal organelles bound by membranes. There are millions of different types of bacteria that are present everywhere and can either help or harm the ecosystem.

There is a higher level of good bacteria in the body, which resides almost everywhere including on the skin, inside the mouth, stomach, intestines, etc. The basic job of good bacteria is to fight off bad bacteria and keep it from entering the system. The bacteria on the skin keep the bad germs and viruses from entering the system. The bacteria inside the mouth help in the chewing and digestion of the food. There is an old wives’ tale that suggested spitting on any cuts or bruises to keep the bruise healthy. Well, this was done to ensure that the bacteria in the human saliva would keep the wound from becoming infected with bad bacteria.

The bacteria inside the stomach also help with digestion. These bacteria ensure that our body is healthy and virus free. Without these bacteria inside our system we would die. Hence, it is important to have these bacteria. These bacteria are often affected when a person consumed way too many antibacterial medications that start destroying the bacteria.

Bad bacteria are known as bad for a reason, as it intends to harm the human system. These bacteria are responsible for damaging the internal functions, causing the body to spin out of balance. Bad bacteria cause viruses, illness and can even cause death. These bacteria intend to damage or weaken the body’s immune system, which is responsible for fighting the bad bacteria. If the bacteria succeed in weakening the immune system, the bacteria can further shut down other processes and completely stop body functions, resulting in death.

Bad bacteria usually enter the body though open wounds, cuts, contaminated foods, etc. Any such bacteria entering the body can then go around trying to spread havoc. If the infection is dealt with before it causes significant damage, then the body can fight the bacteria. However, there are certain bacteria that the immune system cannot fight against naturally and requires antibiotics or special medications to deal with it. Hence, it is said that using antibacterial products should be kept to a minimum, but it should be used in case of touching unclean objects. Yogurt is one object that has a large amount of good bacteria that helps digestion.

Image Courtesy: 2011.igem.org, healthyfellow.com

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