Question: how do bugs get into your lungs:)

Jean Bourke answered on 12 Nov 2012:

Hi,

Bugs get into your lungs when you breath them in. I work on tuberculosis (tb), which mainly infects the lungs, you get infected by breathing in tb bacteria floating in the air. When the bacteria get in there your body tried to fight them off but sometime some escape and breed making you sick.

They get into the air when people cough without covering their mouths which is why it’s really important to do so. Ideally cover your mouth with a tissue then throw this tissue away. If you haven’t got a tissue cough into your elbow joint, that way you don’t touch stuff with hand covered in bacteria. Don’t cough into your hands coz then everything you tough becomes potentially infectious, if you do so, wash your hand or use hand sanitiser.

The common cold is a virus (a different type of bug) and it mainly gets in through your nose! It infects the soft tissue at the back of your nose and throat. This is why your nose runs and your throat gets somer:they both try to shed the infected tissue and wash away the virus with snot. You spread the virus by sneezing and touching things with your snotty hands after blowing your nose.

You can get a nasty cough when you have a cold but that’s not directly due to the cold virus. When we’re sick our bodies are really busy fighting the infection and so it can kind of take it’s eye on the ball. That is when other bugs can get in, or maybe they were already there but under control, with your immune system already under pressure they settle down and start breeding really quickly.

All this stuff about bacterial being good for you is not true. It is true that some bacteria are good for us and help build up our immune systems; our skin is covered in bacteria that do no harm at all and just eat bits of dead skin; and our guts are full of bacteria that help us get nutrients from food. However, not all bacteria are so harmless! It’s best to be careful especially around sick people, animals, children and public transport. It’s important both to avoid becoming infected and not to infect others!