Humans get sick when drinking dirty water, so how do wild animals survive drinking mainly dirty water?

GatoB@lemmy.world to No Stupid Questions@lemmy.world – 23 points –
5

It's a misconception that wild animals don't get sick drinking dirty water. Humans can drink dirty water, they just get really sick - animals do too. Some have microbiomes that do offer some protection, but, animals get sick from dirty water all the time.

They are just sick like all the damn time.

We've evolved to spend more energy on our brain and intelligence. Animals can have better immune systems, plus they'll build up a resistance to the pathogens.

People who constantly drink dirty water will also develop resistance

2 more...

I think they basically have built up a tolerance to those bacteria. They probably got sick at some point and survived.