According to a story in today’s U.S. News and Report, a new study from Kuopio University Hospital, in Finland, found that babies in homes with dogs and cats are less likely to get sick.  The study showed that babies were less susceptible to colds, ear infections, and respiratory illnesses. The study of 400 children showed that a child with a dog is 29% less likely to need antibiotics.

 “Children who had dog contacts at home were healthier and had less frequent ear infections and needed fewer courses of antibiotics than children who had no dog contacts,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Eija Bergroth, a pediatrician who worked at Kuopio University Hospital, in Finland, at the time of the study.

 Bergroth also noted that “cat contacts did not seem to have as strong of an impact on infection frequency in multivariate analysis as the dog contacts.”

 Results of the study, released online July 9, will be published in the August print issue of Pediatrics.