Why do bacteria tend to become resistant to most antibotics but rarely become resistant to herbal medicine?

is this even true statement?

Why do bacteria tend to become resistant to most antibotics but rarely become resistant to herbal medicine?
The goal of medicine is to cure or control a certain illness. However, herbal remedies focus on strengthening the body and allow the body to do its job. A strong and healthy immune system will throw anything out.





Herbal supplements (not herbal medicine) are natural byproducts of nature. Many of the incurable diseases are curable to some degree with the right plants found somewhere on this planet.
Reply:Alternative propaganda!
Reply:Because herbal medicine is almost never used, so bacteria don't need to develop resistance to survive as a whole. The more a medicine is used the more likely it is to get a resistance, which is why overmedicating is such a problem.





Also... because alternative medicines usually suck in the first place, so you wouldn't be able to tell even if it DID build up a resistance. =p But that's just my humble uneducated opinion.
Reply:Bacteria haven't survived this long by being easy to kill or disable. Bacteria where on the planet before the human gene ever developed.


Also, don't believe for a second that herbal remedies kill bacteria. The symptoms one may suffer might ease, but not the problem with the way bacteria destroy cells.....
Reply:For one thing bacteria are routinely tested for resistance to various antibiotics so we are aware of resistance. This is called sensitivity testing and is a valuable aid in treating people with serious bacterial infections.





Today no one is conducting sensitivity testing on herbal medicines. There are several reasons for this. First and most important there is absolutely NO herbal medicine that can be broken down into its active (if there are any) ingredients. With accepted antibiotics there is detailed knowledge of how the antibiotic works at the biochemical level. With herbals no such knowledge exists. In fact, there is no agreement among herbal practioners on the effective dose (if one exists) of the many herbal medicines. In the limited number of controlled studies concerning herbals that have been published no therapeutic effect has been demonstrated to date. Perhaps bacteria don't demonstrate resistance to herbals because herbals don't kill bacteria in the first place.
Reply:*wild speculation alert*





It's hard to come up with a substance that you can put into your body that will decimate bacteria without harming you. That's why all of the antibiotics we have are variations on a few basic molecular designs. The claims I've seen on herbal medicines seem to have more to do with boosting the immune system than killing the bacteria directly. I don't know a lot about the actual research on their effectiveness, so let's just assume they work to some degree for the purpose of this speculation.





Normally when bacteria become resistant to antibiotics, bacteria that mutate or acquire new genes that prevent that one substance from being able to kill them will quickly be selected for and will outnumber the non-resistant ones. They only have to become resistant to one thing (if only one type of antibiotic is being given) and they have it made. Becoming resistant to the immune system is a little more complicated. The immune system has evolved a lot of different strategies to neutralize and destroy bacteria; it's not a one-trick pony. Not only does it have a variety of strategies, but it's adaptable. If a bacterium develops the ability to destroy the herbal substance that boosts the immune system (possibly by metabolizing it for energy?), it won't have any particular advantage over the other bacteria infecting that person because the immune response affects them all the same way.





*end of wild speculation*