Chronic bacterial infections are more common than what you might think. I recently interviewed Trisha E. O’Hehir, a highly experienced dental hygienist and editor, probing (punny, eh?) for the magic number which quantifies the extent of oral disease in America. Her answer was better than a squishy statistic based on evolving demographic data…and probably more accurate:

Me: How many people in America don’t have chronic bacterial infections in their mouths?

Trisha: The only ones that don’t are most likely dental hygienists and other fastidious dental professionals.

I am mincing her words a bit, but now I see her point. Getting all the bugs out of your gums and teeth is really tricky business! And finding dental professionals that know how to remove biofilms from the teeth — and between the teeth and the gums — is even more difficult.

So I am paying more attention to my teeth and gums now. And I continue to scour news sources for any and all biofilm articles — especially the ones that are about biofilms but are afraid to use the “biofilm” word. I post some of these more detailed articles on my biofilmcommunity site for people who want to get into the slippery and pathogenic aspects of bacterial biofilms.

This article earlier today caught my eye, so I commented on some of the glaring omissions. I was happy to see that they published my comments on their article on oral disease. In my comment, you’ll see the stat from the AAP that state that 75% of adult Americans have oral disease.

So there it is: plain, simple and yucky.