Antibiotic Essay

Hunting the Nightmare Bacteria documentary has had me paranoid. It’s scary to think foreign bacteria can enter your body and shut it down. The most informing information was the NDM-1 wasn’t a bacteria it was a resistance gene that can turn bacteria into superbugs. I do think antibiotics are being over used. I agree with M.D Arjun Srinivasan,” the more you expose a bacteria to an antibiotic, the greater the likelihood that resistance to that antibiotic is going to develop. So the more antibiotics we put into people, we put into the environment, the more opportunities we create for these bacteria to become resistant”.

However, everybody who has contact with the patient or the environment is entitled to relevant information that will enable them to reduce the risks of transmission to

When non-resistant bacteria are exposed to an antibiotic, most of them die. But due to the increase of mutations some of the bacteria are becoming resistance to the antibiotic. The bacteria are all subject to natural selection. Natural selection is as simple as saying that the bacteria that have not developed a mutation or resistance that helps them to survive die. The ones that do, survive and pass on the mutation to the next generation. This means that we are constantly having to adapt our antibiotics because so much of the mutation is getting passed along. The flu vaccination is a good example of how mutations are carried over and how the vaccine had to be changed every year to fight the ever changing virus. Some strains

A couple times a year local and national mass media put the spotlight on problems connected to antibiotic overuse. Some people consider those problems to be real and serious, and others think that the discussed topics are nothing more than new “fashionable” subjects to talk about, distracting people from “real” problems, such as climbing gas prices or war expenses. Meanwhile, antibiotic overuse continues as a common practice among US doctors and agribusinesses for the last 20 years. The practice of antibiotic overuse has put patient’s health at risk, contributed to antibiotic resistance and increased bacterial mutation to a new, stronger level; as well as it hitting the economy with new costly expenses in health care. It is time to stop

Antibiotics are inarguably one of the greatest advances in medical science of the past century. Although the first natural antibiotic Penicillin was not discovered until 1928 by Scottish biologist Alexander Flemming, evidence exists that certain plant and mold growths were used to treat infections in ancient Egypt, ancient India, and classical Greece (Forrest, 1982). In our modern world with the advent of synthetic chemistry synthetic antibiotics like Erithromycin and its derivative Azithromycin have been developed. Antibiotics have many uses including the treatment of bacterial and protozoan infection, in surgical operations and prophylactically to prevent the development of an infection. Through these applications, antibiotics have saved countless lives across the world and radically altered the field of medicine. Though a wonderful and potentially lifesaving tool, antibiotic use is not without its disadvantages. Mankind has perhaps been too lax in regulation and too liberal in application of antibiotics and growing antibiotic resistance is the price we must now pay. A recent study showed that perhaps 70% of bacterial infections acquired during hospital visits in the United States are resistant to at least one class of antibiotic (Leeb, 2004). Bacteria are not helpless and their genetic capabilities have allowed them to take advantage of society’s overuse of antibiotics, allowing them to develop

by Dr. Alexander Fleming. As test continued, Fleming began to realize that he was on the verge of a great discovery. However, he still did not know the identity of the fungus, and had little knowledge of fungi. His crude extracts could be diluted 1,000 times and still be effective in killing bacteria. After years of working on penicillin and going nowhere, many of his co-workers grew tired of hearing about it. The first real test for penicillin came when a 48-year-old police officer nicked himself shaving. After a time, Alexander's face became infected and he developed a temperature. When he was rushed to the hospital, the doctors believed that he had only hours

we are curing disease. As we use antibiotics, the rapidly mutating microbes grow resistant. While

Resistance among bacteria to current antibiotics may cause a new pre-antibiotic era, where common bacterial infections become as lethal as before the invention of the first antibiotic penicillin. With resistance on the rise, ‘simple’ surgery, cancer treatment and organ transplantation may become impossible.[4] Despite this very big and real threat[1], big pharmaceutical companies have abandoned or decreased their efforts to develop new antibiotics, while the demand for new and broad –and small– spectrum antibiotics is increasing.[2] [3] In this paper I will give an outline of the main factors why big pharmaceutical companies are no longer developing new antibiotics and I will attempt to pose possible solutions –call it Utopian solutions– that may turn the tide before it is too late.

The article “The End of Antibiotics” discusses a 57 year old man that was dying and how doctors could only sit by while his condition deteriorated. This man was not shot or stabbed, he was infected with antibiotic resistant bacteria that was slowly killing him. He died months later after being bombarded with antibiotics in the form of capsules, tablets, and IVs (Begley par.1). This is the unsettling power that superbugs like this one has over modern day medicine. A superbug is a bacteria that has evolved its cellular structure to resist antibiotics. Dr. Richard Wenzel of the University of Iowa stated, “Only a few years after penicillin came into wide use with World War II, strains of staph had emerged

    These are many killers that damage generations, but there is one tiny thing that has caused countless deaths and injuries throughout history -- Superbugs. It caused 700,000 deaths every year, and it was estimated to kill 10 million lives each year by 2050, which would cost over 100 trillion dollars per year and a worldwide economic output reduction of 2% to 3.5%, etc.(Walsh,para2) Surprisingly, superbugs are caused by nothing else but overusing “life-saver”: antibiotics. Thus, we must significantly limit the use of antibiotics in medicine and agriculture in order to stop the creation of deadly, drug-resistant “Superbugs.”

(Lee, 2013) Since that time only two truly novel classes (oxazolidinones in 2000 and cyclic lipopeptides in 2003) of antibiotics have been introduced. With that being said there are still many promising new treatments being studied in the clinic today that could potential lead to significant advances in the treatment of infectious diseases. One such class uses enzymes to degrade the extracellular polymeric substance of biofilms making the bacteria more vulnerable to antibiotics. Another interesting development is the use of nanomaterials for the delivery of antibiotics.

Antibiotics have played a major role in our society thanks to Sir Alexander Fleming's careful observations in 1928. Without it, many lives would be in danger due to infectious diseases. Antibiotics are chemical substances produced by various species of microorganisms and other living systems that are capable in small concentrations of inhibiting the growth of or killing bacteria and other microorganisms. These organisms can be bacteria, viruses, fungi, or animals called protozoa. A particular group of these agents is made up of drugs called antibiotics, from the Greek word anti ("against") and bios ("life").

Bacteria is able to become resistant to antibiotics meaning when characteristics are ‘favourable’ within a population e.g. resistance to antibiotics, through evolution by natural selection the ‘favourable’ characteristic is passed on to the next generation. This is a problem as the effectiveness of antibiotics is quickly reduced as the population grows. There are organisms known as superbugs which are resistant to almost all antibiotics that are available

In my research, I’ve noticed a change in our path to great health as the tables have turned for us. Antibiotics have always been a drug to turn to when we want to fight bacteria, but now the bacteria are growing stronger and fighting back to the point where they’re winning and we don’t have any solid guarantee of stopping them. In fact, we don’t even have a cure for these bacteria- or superbugs. So, when we send more antibiotics into the system with the intentions of diminishing the body of these bugs, it only makes matters worse as it can only increase the immunity of the bacteria towards the drug.

The overuse of antibiotics has been a problem for well over a decade. This misuse leads to many nonvisible problems arising within the human population. As the use of antibiotics increases, the number of antibiotic resistant bacteria also increases. When bacteria become resistant to an antibiotic, another antibiotic must be used to try and kill it and the cycle becomes vicious. Michael Martin, Sapna Thottathil, and Thomas Newman stated that antimicrobial resistance is, “an increasingly serious threat to global public health that requires action across all government sectors and society” (2409).