Giant Microbes ~

Halloween is just around the corner… do you have the perfect gift yet? I’m sure your kids and friends might love the traditional candy, but what if you were to throw a little surprise is there. What if you were to give them Giant Microbes? Over this past year, I have grown to love these crazy little creatures! They are an extremely fun way to educate your young ones about the seriousness of a disease. I think kids will actually listen and learn when you approach education this way because it makes the lesson fun!

With every giant microbe that we have received so far, we have gotten some type of helpful information about the germ we picked. This time around, we picked 3 different petri dishes and a carved pumpkin filled with 5 creatures. Each of the dishes contained one of the following: Black Death, Ebola, and Anthrax. Each little germ comes in a jelly like substance that contains an enlarged form of the germ. On the lid of the dish, there is also an actual picture of the germ; on the top you will find a card that contains helpful information about the disease that you have chosen. In the pumpkin, each little germ is dressed up (as if it were getting ready for Halloween!). In the pumpkin there is Flesh eating disease (dressed as a vampire), Anthrax (dressed as a witch), Amoeba (dressed as what appears to be some sort of bandit), Ebola (dressed as Frankenstein), and Black Death (as a skull).

Anthrax
“Though the word “anthrax” conjures up fearsome thoughts of biological weapons, anthrax is a once-common disease caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis. Nearly all human anthrax infections are found on the skin. These infections are rarely fatal and more or less non-contagious. However, gastrointestinal and inhalational anthrax infections- which result from ingesting or inhaling anthrax- can be deadly.”

Black Death
“In 1347 the Black Death (then called the “pestilence”) arrived in the city of Messina in Sicily. By 1352, 25 million people, a third of Europe’s population, were dead. The plague has not been eradicated, but outbreaks today are few and isolated. In addition, there are readily available treatments including the antibiotic Tetracycline. Nevertheless, antibiotic- resistant strains could one day become prevalent and history could repeat itself again…”

Ebola
“Although the origins of Ebola hemorrhagic fever are unknown, the virus was first recognized in 1976 near the Ebola river in the Congo in Africa. You do not want to get Ebola. A short incubation period of 2 to 21 days presages symptoms which include fever, aches, sore throat and weakness, followed by diarrhea, stomach pain, vomiting, internal and external bleeding, and often times death.”

I love the information cards that come with Giant Microbes. I think any person who really digs science will really dig Giant Microbes. The information provided with Giant Microbes also helps to teach you precautionary measures in dealing with these germs. We love Giant Microbes and have amassed quite a collection of them now! We hope that you love them, too!

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