• Question: Is eating bogies from your nose good for you?

    Asked by nessy123 to Adam, Joanna, Louise S, Louise W, Marcus on 16 Nov 2012.
    • Photo: Louise Stanley

      Louise Stanley answered on 16 Nov 2012:

      Yuck! I hope not otherwise I am not going to do very well!

    • Photo: Joanna Giles

      Joanna Giles answered on 16 Nov 2012:

      Hi Nessy!
      well it’s not the most tasty think I can think of to snack on! Wouldn’t you prefer some snack a jacks?
      Snot is really just mucus, and mucus is an important barrier of our immune system – it works to trap bugs and dust and keep them out of our insides! It’s produced by special mucosal cells and contains lots of sugars and antiseptic enzymes (which are proteins). So I don’t think eating these would be BAD for you…but I wouldn’t want to do it! 🙂

    • Photo: Louise Walkin

      Louise Walkin answered on 17 Nov 2012:

      Hello!! I hope not! There are plenty of other yummy things to eat instead of bogies. When you think of everything that the mucus traps (there are lots of other things like Joanna says) it probably isn’t good too eat them! I don’t think it would harm you but I would suggest to anyone – eat something else! Chocolate! 🙂

    • Photo: Adam Paige

      Adam Paige answered on 19 Nov 2012:

      As Joanna says – they are full of germs. The mucus lines all the airpipes in the lungs. And the lung cells have special waving arms called cilia that push the mucus up out of the lungs into our throats for us to cough up or swallow. A cellular escalator. It is part of keeping our lungs healthy. Once in our stomach it is not unhealthy…but do you really fancy the idea of eating dried mucus containing bacteria?

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