Do any of these farm experiences sound familiar? Feel free to check all that apply:
- Washing your hands before eating lunch delivered to the field is not usually an option.
- The carrot is not completely devoid of soil when you eat it while standing in the garden.
- The dog licks the kids’ faces and they laugh and enjoy it.
- You swallow a few bugs while swathing and baling.
- You suspect you have also swallowed the odd pinch of manure while working cattle on sloppy days.
- The barn cats get a pat or a scratch under the chin when you or the kids go by.
- A Kleenex is not always near at hand when your nose runs while working outside.
- Horse hair, cow hair, dog hair and/or cat hair might be found on your clothing.
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If any of that resonates, consider yourself lucky. Farming isn’t the cleanest line of work but you probably don’t have asthma and, because you’ve already imbibed your quota, you’ll probably never have to take dirt pills.
Dirt pills, you say? According to The Australian newspaper, a researcher Down Under is giving children dirt pills “as part of a revolutionary treatment for asthma.”
Susan Prescott hypothesizes that the pills will provide her subjects with the germs they weren’t exposed to at an earlier age. Lack of exposure resulted in their failure to develop certain immunities, she theorizes, which led to development of allergies including asthma.
Thus she is prescribing pills with different strains of probiotic bacteria and antioxidants to see if her subjects’ symptoms improve.
As The Australian reports, there is “a rising trend of childhood asthma in affluent countries, which is widely thought to be a product of inadequate early exposure to germs, and a diet with insufficient fruit and other antioxidant-rich foods.”
Prescott is also conducting a study with pregnant women to see if greater exposure to germs can reduce the chances of mothers passing allergies to their babies.
Chalk it up as another advantage to living a rural lifestyle. In the heart of this affluent country, farm families have an advantageous exposure to germs. The people are just as clean but are likely healthier in some respects than their urban counterparts.
In times like these, it’s important to note such benefits and revel in their application.
As I think back on my own farm upbringing, I’m almost embarrassed to recall the way I chastised Buttercup when she switched her manure-laden tail in my face during milking.
Had I known she was administering a healthy dose of probiotics, I’m sure I would have reacted quite differently.
