Eating sugar while taking antibiotics might harm gut bacteria - CNN

Sugary foods combined with antibiotic treatment can damage the gut microbiome in ways that could leave people vulnerable to dangerous infections, a new study shows. The new research, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, took advantage of a natural experiment: It looked at what happened to gut bacteria in cancer patients who were hospitalized and treated with sustained antibiotics before receiving stem cell transplants. Because the patients only ate food prepared by the hospital, researchers knew exactly what and how much food they ate – a rarity in nutrition studies, which typically rely on participants to recall what they ate hours or days earlier, something people are notoriously bad at. The gut microbiome consists of trillions of bacteria, viruses and other microbes that populate human intestines. These tiny organisms perform a host of functions including helping with digestion, making essential vitamins, and playing a role in immune function.