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"If MCR-1 becomes global, which is a case of when not if, and the gene aligns itself with other antibiotic resistance genes, which is inevitable, then we will have very likely reached the start of the post-antibiotic era.
"At that point if a patient is seriously ill, say with E. coli, then there is virtually nothing you can do."
Gonna start packing my car for Hemingford Home, Nebraska.
We are getting pretty close to the post antibiotic era with diseases adapting faster than we can produce new antibiotics, getting to the point where the only thing that we'll be able to do for common bacterial diseases is to recommend a whole lot of rest and hope for the best.
Bacteria can evolve these abilities quite quickly due to their high reproduction rate. Overuse of antibiotics for things which can't actually be treated with antibiotics does not help.
This risk has been in bio textbooks for decades. My GP who I've been seeing for decades has always told me that he didn't want to prescribe antibiotics "willy-nilly". He's gone so far as to write a prescription but request that I not fill it for x number of days to see if the bug goes away on its own. Basically, biology buffs have known this was coming all along. It's alarming and I largely blame big agriculture for over medicating livestock. I don't believe over prescription is the largest factor.
Gonna start packing my car for Hemingford Home, Nebraska.
Evolution in action. Nature - in this case, bacteria - finds a way.
Though this could not have been prevented, it could have been delayed significantly. However, people were lazy (refusing to follow through on prescriptions once healthy, thereby allowing residual resistant bacteria to survive and propagate), greedy (industrial use of antibiotics because, screw the future, all that matters are the next quarterly profits), and willful ignorance (the anti-science brigades who stand utterly opposed to the underlying reality here: evolution).
Evolution in action. Nature - in this case, bacteria - finds a way.
Though this could not have been prevented, it could have been delayed significantly. However, people were lazy (refusing to follow through on prescriptions once healthy, thereby allowing residual resistant bacteria to survive and propagate), greedy (industrial use of antibiotics because, screw the future, all that matters are the next quarterly profits), and willful ignorance (the anti-science brigades who stand utterly opposed to the underlying reality here: evolution).
Overuse of antibiotics. This was proven when penicillin was the rage.
We've been down this path before. It was not unknown what WOULD happen.
No need to be frightened. There are many things found in nature known to be antibacterial or in other words, "antibiotics of the alt health world". You probably already have some of these in your kitchen. This is just a short list.
Acacia
Aloe
Cryptolepsis
Echinacea
Eucalyptus Garlic Ginger
Golden Seal
Grapefruit Seed Extract Honey
Juniper
Licorice Sage
Usnea
Wormwood
This is however a good wake up call that you can't fool mother nature as bacteria and virus' can and do evolve and outsmart us all the time.
No need to be frightened. There are many things found in nature known to be antibacterial or in other words, "antibiotics of the alt health world". You probably already have some of these in your kitchen. This is just a short list.
Acacia
Aloe
Cryptolepsis
Echinacea
Eucalyptus Garlic Ginger
Golden Seal
Grapefruit Seed Extract Honey
Juniper
Licorice Sage
Usnea
Wormwood
oh good. we can tell all those scientists and researchers to go home, the problem is solved. garlic and ginger for the win.
While there may be some merit to using those plants as topical treatments for minor scratches they are not going to be strong enough to be added to IV drips or used post-surgically. The real problem here is that the antibiotics usually reserved to treat resistant strains of bacterium are failing. The typical antibiotic you are likely to get from your doctor is going to be amoxicillin or zithromax or even ciprofloxacin (which at least used to be reserved for nastier infections) or related antibiotics. Doctors reserve other antibiotics (like the one in the article) for more serious cases where the first defense antibiotics aren't working. In this case Colistin is an older antibiotic that has been brought back into use because strains of bacteria are becoming resistant to the more frequently prescribed meds. But, due to its overuse in livestock in China strains are showing resistance to it as well.
I really don't know if the bacterium they are discussing in the article are resistant to ALL the antibiotics mankind knows of. But it is very alarming that antibiotic saved as last lines of defense in people are being used wholesale on livestock as a preventative against infection due to overcrowding and improper diet/ conditions that factory farms are pretty much coerced to maintain them in. It's not even that these drugs are used to treat existing outbreaks, it's that they treat the livestock as a matter of routine because otherwise infection is such a guarantee that is really distressing.
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