Streptococcus in foods

[ptcgirl]

I'm becoming very concerned about Streptococcus in foods. After doing a little bit of research I've found that the bacteria is used in nearly all cheeses and yogurt, plus it is in "the production of pickled vegetables, beer or wine, some breads, and other fermented foodstuffs, such as soymilk kefir, buttermilk, and others[12]." Interestingly it also changed names.... I wonder why?!?! It is now called Lactococcus lactis according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactococcus_lactis

 

My question: is this where all of the antibiotic resistant strains are coming from? The overuse of this strain and not allowing it to fully develop.... I'm not a scientist but this seems like it could cause major issues.

 

Anyone know anything about this? Has anyone tried completely taking out all dairy? I guess breads and the other stuff too?

 

So intrigued by all of this.

[kthomas]

We did try taking out all dairy and gluten. It helped with congestion, which kept sinus infections at bay, but did not affect the tics, OCD or behavioral issues. The only thing that helped those was the rx for azithromycin was 500mg 1 X per week has just changed to 250 mg daily. DS8 weighs 54lbs. We have also been doing probiotics - Yum-Yum Dophilus found in the refrigerated section of Sprouts - and natural anti-inflamatories like fish oil and tummeric. We now limit dairy and gluten, but occasionally allow them on special occasions.

[MashedTaters]

I did lots of reading last week about it too.

We eliminated all yogurt, and aren't allowing cheese for the time being in our PANDAS kid, exception of 'baked' cheese to where the bacteria dies off. We're really sad about the no 'foyo' anymore too! But i'll just get him a MCD's ice cream before we go, so not so bad.

uuuuugh. He's so very sensitive, that eliminating all i can would be beneficial.

[mar]

This is way too interesting. Yes both my kids are dairy free and gluten free. For ds we went this route b/c he is sensitive we found out and supposedly allergic to milk. It helped out greatly with congestion plus all his other eliminations. He has not had a sinus infection in almost three years where at that point he was chronic. His tics and other behaviors improved with his diet also. It's seems that when strep hits he has a setback. But for him the milk/ gluten free seems to help. If he is not congested and miserable he seems to do better overall. His sniffling tic and blinking tics went away. He has been on culturelle probiotoc. Lately which I need to research now.

Mar

[ptcgirl]

I'm still pretty concerned about all of the strep being in these items. Can't believe I never knew it before. I'm going to eliminate yogurt and (uncooked)cheese from my DD's diet. We eliminated gluten before for her but it didn't seem to make any difference at all. Very interesting. I'll keep you posted on the results. I'm not sure what to do about the probiotic pills now. I'm looking for one that isn't Lactococcus lactis based and without Streptococcus. Just not sure if one is or isn't at this point. Any ideas?

[Kiera]

As far as I know, strep thermophilus is still different from Lactococcus lactis, and both florastor and culturelle don't have strep ther. Removing strep ther. made a big diffrence in my kid!

[ptcgirl]

As far as I know, strep thermophilus is still different from Lactococcus lactis, and both florastor and culturelle don't have strep ther. Removing strep ther. made a big diffrence in my kid!

 

so this is the confusing part to me. They ARE different, but the ingredient listings on probiotics doesn't differentiate between them from what I can tell. Both strep thermophilus and lactococcus latis are from the same "Order, Lactobacillales," for the bacteria (although they are different strains from what I can tell. On the Culturelle it states that the probiotic is Lactobacillus GG. (Not sure what the GG stands for.)So, couldn't it be either strep thermophilus or lactococcus latis since they are part of that same order? I copied this from http://microbewiki.kenyon.edu/index.php/Streptococcus_thermophilus:

 

 

Higher order taxa:

Kingdom: Bacteria

Phylum: Firmicutes

Class: Bacilli

Order: Lactobacillales

Family: Streptococcaceae

Genus: Streptococcus

Species: Streptococcus thermophilus

 

Still very confused about all of this. Wish I had a degree in biology so I could really understand all of this....

[ptcgirl]

Ah ha! Found something new! There is a difference in the Culturelle stuff! They use Lactobacillus GG YAY!

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7552958

 

Effect of Lactobacillus rhamnosus strain GG (ATCC 53103) on the growth of Streptococcus sobrinus in vitro.

 

Abstract

Lactobacillus GG, a recently characterized L. rhamnosus GG strain (ATCC 53103), has been shown to exert inhibitory activity against a variety of bacterial species, including streptococci. We isolated and studied the effect of the inhibitory substance of Lactobacillus GG on some oral streptococci. The inhibitory activity of the isolated substance was weak, but some growth inhibition was observed in Streptococcus sobrinus pretreated with the substance in comparison with untreated controls. Zones of growth inhibition on agar plates were apparent only at pH values below 5, indicating that the inhibitory activity was restricted to a low pH range. Growth curve experiments showed a statistically significant inhibition between series with and without the isolated substance (P < 0.05). The ultrastructure of S. sobrinus was not affected when treated with the inhibitory substance. The Lactobacillus GG itself did not ferment sucrose. The results offer interesting perspectives for future research focusing on the protective function of normal flora and in the attempt to replace harmful bacterial species in oral microflora with less harmful ones.

[Kiera]

All I can say is I still use florastor, just stopped yougert and uncooked cheese and say a big difference. There's also the issue of live active cultures vs non live (just to confuse us more!)

[ptcgirl]

Sounds like the right plan for us too.