A new study has found that owning a pet has beneficial effects in the body. Pets like dogs have certain microbes that could prevent the risk of obesity and allergy, particularly in babies.

Babies who came from families with pets develop microbes associated with lower allergy and obesity risk, according to the research from the University of Alberta in Canada. Dogs were the most owned pet of the families which gathers about 70 percent.

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The Canadian research team examined the fecal sample of infants from the Canadian Healthy Infant Longitudinal Development study. They discovered that babies who were just in the mother's womb or up to three months after birth already had increased levels of the Ruminococcus and Oscillospira bacteria after being exposed to pets. These bacteria were known in decreasing the risk of childhood allergies and obesity.

According to Anita Kozyrskyj, a pediatric epidemiologist at University of Alberta and co-author of the study, the abundance of these bacteria have increased for about twofold when a family owns a pet in the house. Researchers also believed that there is already a beneficial effect if pets like a dog are given away just before birth.

The most common events that limit the immunity-boosting exchange of mothers and children are using antibiotics during pregnancy, not breastfeeding, and C-section deliveries. But the study showed that babies who received pets boost their immunity even in these situations. The researchers assumed that the two bacteria imitate the effects of certain pills to prevent allergies.

Kozyrskyj further added that it is not impossible for the pharmaceutical industry to develop supplement using these microbes just like probiotics. Apart from the beneficial effects of pets on allergies and obesity, they are also known to be involved in developing intelligence, according to previous research at the University of Chicago.