Did everyone stink in the olden days

[Hooch]

Hey,

Do you think in medieval times/victorian times etc that everyone had funky breath due to a lack of toothbrushes etc?

And the streets probably stank due to lack of drains etc so sewage was strewn in the streets ...so..we'd have fitted right in...heh...

[KeepTrying09]

Well I'm sure a lot of people's breath didn't smell like roses back during those times. But I'm glad I live in this century. There's no way I could give up the internet, hehe.

[Bazy]

Thats too funny !!! I was just thinking the same thing myself the other day.

[Hooch]

yeah I like this century too...they didn't have PS3 in 1066 and besides I suppose they had better things to worry about than being smelly...like avoiding the plague, sabre tooth tigers and getting an arrow through the head...I'm aware I am mixing my centuries and time lines...heh

[Archimonde]

There are studies done on aborigine people and they have perfect dentition and mouth health because food with sugar is extremely rare in the wild (wild fruits taste bitter, not sweet). I wouldn't be surprised if chronic bad breath is something that simply doesn't exist if you live outside/lived before civilization.

The explorers who studied Eskimos/Inuit in Northern Quebec have reported the same thing. And when Inuits are introduced to processed food, their health decline.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weston_Price
http://www.journeytoforever.org/farm_li ... cetoc.html

"In his studies he claimed to have found that plagues of modern civilization (headaches, general muscle fatigue, dental caries or cavities, impacted molars, tooth crowding, allergies, heart disease, asthma, and degenerative diseases such as tuberculosis and cancer) were not present in those cultures sustained by indigenous diets. However, within a single generation these same cultures experienced all the above listed ailments with the inclusion of Western foods in their diet: refined sugars, refined flours, canned goods, etc."



I recently watched "Food inc", http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1286537/ excellent documentary. There's a snippet that i found pretty interesting, this scientist was saying that many cows who are put on a grain diet develop serious bacterial diseases such as e.coli and must be treated with antibiotics. But if they put the cows back on grass (which is what they should be eating), the bacterial activity in their stomach decreases by 80% only after 5 days. Could be a coincidence but my BB decreases by that much if i stop eating grains. I wouldn't be surprised if perfectly mimic'ing an indigenous diet would result in fresh breath. Now the problem is that the meat, fruit, etc in supermarkets have all been domesticated and are nothing like in the wild.

Not to be a pessimist but if the beef industry which literally has billions of $ to their disposal couldn't figure out how to prevent bacterial proliferation from happening in cows' stomachs.. those of us with digestive halitosis (Type 3?) have no chance, we're only clueless people on an internet forum :/

[halitosisux]

Arch does that apply to all cows or just a percentage? If there is a food connection of the kind you seem to be suspecting, dont you think a lot more humans would have this type of BB? Cow's actual stomachs are very different to ours, they have different sections and have bacterial populations in them and produce massive amounts of methane etc. They've evolved to eat huge amounts of nothing but grass every day, so such abrupt changes to their diet for the sake of better yields for farmers is bound to affect them in such ways. Humans evolved to eat a far more varied diet because of their higher dexterity so they are far less likely to be affected than a cow might be.

And its a fact that even something as majorly disruptive within the digestive system as crohn's disease does not always result in that person having BB. I think BB is either due to a hereditary dysfunction or weakness of chemical or immunological function and processing within the body, such as happens with TMAU or something which affects the ecology and/or chemisty of the areas where bacteria reside, such as the pH and hydration levels for example, or its the result of an acquired or developed disease process, such as sinus and other similar infections involving any surface of the mucous membranes, dental problem, structural problems like those which occur along the esophagus or the intestine, and cavities such as the sinuses that have intricate drainage and aspiration requirements.

I realise that some people avoid dairy and find they no longer have BB or that they have reduced it. But that might be for no reason other than fact that dairy is one of the worst things we can consume for type 1 BB and the direct effect on bacterial activity levels in the throat and tongue surface. I dont recall anyone saying that its been purely by cutting out the lactose. And then what do we often see the results being measured against? REACTIONS - hardly reliable feedback when you've become supersensitized to watching for things u either want to see or dont want to see happening.

Yes, some people may have underlying reasons, like some of those mentioned above, that make them more susceptible to the disruption caused by such food intolerances. But I doubt intolerances as a direct cause because not everyone with these intolerances has BB.

[hope4now]

Until the invention of refined sugar, most people had relatively healthy teeth and kept them for life. There were also much fewer illnesses and epidemics. Refined sugar is the primary culprit for most of the disease in the world, chronic and acute, including tooth decay, which is also a disease.

Initially, refined sugar was too expensive for the peasants, so only the elite suffered its many harmful effects on their health.