Does the antibiotic activity of garlic kill off the good gut bacteria?

If pharmaceutical antibiotics kill off all the gut bacteria, including the good guys, does raw garlic, ingested, do the same? I've done research on how healthy raw garlic is (if you can get it down! ;), but can't find out how it affects the gastric biodome. ??

Good question.

I don't think it kills off all bacteria. I often use raw garlic for fermented foods like kimchi and fermented garlic (garlic, salt, and water). They create a lactic ferment quite quickly.

Kimchi has some amazing probiotic qualities, and garlic is an essential ingredient for that... so my uneducated guess is that it is gut friendly.


I wonder if fermented garlic is better for the gut than raw garlic. Sometimes raw garlic gives me stomach stabbies, but fermented garlic goes down fine.

After an abscessed tooth, I'd like to continue 'antibiotics', as in 'raw' garlic. Glad to hear your experience with pickled garlic... am rounding up recipes, and will be trying it soon. In the meantime, I'll continue a spoonful a day of refridgerated butter full of microplaner-minced raw garlic... goes down easily with a slurp of something hot :) Thanks!

Garlic, especially raw garlic, is also a prebiotic, meaning it will be food for the good bacteria that are already in your gut. Every time I listen to a nutrition/health video or podcast (and I listen to a lot of them) they mention garlic as one of the most healthy things you can eat period. I also ferment it by lacto fermenting. Then the enzymes aren't killed, but it's not so spicy that it hurts.
John S
PDX OR

Thanks, that's just the kind of reassurance I was looking for, after all the current warnings about pharma antibiotics wreaking destruction on our gut microbiome... Perlmutter et al ;)