How many bacteria, fungi and viruses are there in your body?

On Monday Callum, Harry’s friend at school was - well - not at school. He apparently had Strep A and would have to have a few days off - at least until the antibiotics had had a day to work and he had no temperature. He was back in no time and it made Harry think of ways to skive off school! He wondered how many bugs there were in the world and got a real shock. Apparently, there were about 40 trillion bugs in just his body. He couldn’t even work out how many noughts that involved! Only about 100 billion humans had ever existed so it looked like the bugs were winning. There were so many that he decided to concentrate on Strep A – it seemed to be on the news quite a bit and apparently 100 kids had died with it this winter.

At breakfast it was too good an opportunity to miss. His sister had her favourite necklace on: beads on a string. “I think you have bugs on your necklace” Harry announced. She looked suitably annoyed. “Streptococcus means beads on a chain according to the Greeks,” he continued. She stood up and left with what could only be called a flounce - Harry was pleased – a good start to the day!

Then it started – a sore throat and later that night he felt very hot. The next day he had a sort of sandpapery red rash on his tummy and his Mum phoned 111. He did see the Doctor who said he had scarlet fever - he said it was more like scarlatina really as he was not very ill but Harry was now on antibiotics and got two days off school which was almost worth it he thought. When he looked up how you caught it he wondered if Callum had given it to him after all. Apparently, it was really infectious and it took a few days, or a bit longer, to develop. You could get it from droplets of saliva or just by touching something carrying the bug. His Mum made him wash his hands even more than usual.

Later he googled scarlet fever and scarlatina - which seemed to be the same thing. “Perhaps it was not such a good thing really,” he thought. He found out that about 30,000 kids had it every year but it was usually in the spring and had been earlier and more common this year. In some kids – often a bit younger than him, it could be worse and was called iGAS which might have seemed funny but was anything but - It meant invasive group A strep and was a nasty and often fatal version of his illness. “Any way I’ve had it now so won’t get it again,” he said to his Mum. “Sadly, it doesn’t work that way for this crafty bug,” she replied, “but it is usually quite mild so you should be ok.”

Harry got a bit worried after all this – if he had all those noughts of bugs inside him and just one could cause all this that was not good news. Then he found out that most of these bugs are “good bugs”. They actually battled the “bad bugs” and kept them away – sort of crowded them out – and with 40 trillion that was a big crowd! Some actually helped make things his body needed and you could even buy products containing the good bugs. He wasn’t absolutely sure about eating bugs, but many people seemed to which was interesting.

“I’ve decided I don’t mind being home to my bugs,” said Harry to his sister over lunch, “and I think perhaps your necklace is full of good bugs really”. He thought it was a peace offering but she flounced off again anyway!