A compound in garlic, diallyl disulfide, according to an article in the May issue of the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, is more than 100 times more potent than Cipro or erythromycin in food borne illnesses caused by campylobacter, pathogenic E. coli, and listeria infections. There are far more complication from pharmaceutical drugs than from this garlic extract. There are about 2.4 million cases of campylobacter infections in the US annually. Diallyl sulfide is far more capable to penetrating the biofilm these bacteria exude than antibiotics and work in a fraction of the time and far more effectively in shutting down their metabolism.
This compound may be useful as a preservative and as a sterilizing agent to clean industrial food processing equipment.
