Antibiotic Misuse Will Be The Death Of Us All
It started with a tingle in the nasal passages and throat and then moved on into the lungs before evolving into uncontrollable coughing fits and then a fever that spiked at 102.3 degrees.
The process took a couple of weeks, following my son's bought with bronchitis, but by mid-morning yesterday, I realized that this ailment in my system was just going to get worse.
I soldier through the early part of the day and then raced over to the clinic after taking my temperature, scoring an impressive 102.
An hour or so later, I emerged from the doctor visit with some heavy-duty antibiotics, a sore butt and a diagnosis of some nasty bronchitis.
However, within hours after the poked my behind with the alarmingly sized Cajun spice injector-sized syringe, delivering what the doctor called one of the most powerful antibiotics ever invented, I felt incrementally better as the evening progressed and even entertained the idea of a glass of wine. I ultimately opted for another big cup of water mixed with a little lemon juice, apple juice and Pediatlyte. (Try it sometime. It's pretty good!)
Today, I'm back at my desk, feeling about 98 percent and ready to take my wife out to dinner for some Mexican food.
Nevertheless, the antibiotic administration got me to thinking, and worrying, about our increasing inability to fight off bacterial infections. Stories abound about the ever-increasing bacterial strains out there.
Scientists work like crazy to stay ahead of the wave, but some day, something is going along and pose a threat to all of humanity, some superbacteria for which there is no cure.
The first antibiotic, penicillin, was discovered in 1929. Here is the story, according to http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk/bto/microbes/penicill.htm :
"The antibacterial effect of penicillin was discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1929. He noted that a fungal colony had grown as a contaminant on an agar plate streaked with the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, and that the bacterial colonies around the fungus were transparent, because their cells were lysing. Fleming had devoted much of his career to finding methods for treating wound infections, and immediately recognised the importance of a fungal metabolite that might be used to control bacteria. The substance was named penicillin, because the fungal contaminant was identified as Penicillium notatum. Fleming found that it was effective against many Gram positive bacteria in laboratory conditions, and he even used locally applied, crude preparations of this substance, from culture filtrates, to control eye infections. However, he could not purify this compound because of its instability, and it was not until the period of the Second World War (1939-1945) that two other British scientists, Florey and Chain, working in the USA, managed to produce the antibiotic on an industrial scale for widespread use. All three scientists shared the Nobel Prize for this work, and rightly so - penicillin rapidly became the "wonder drug" which saved literally millions of lives."
We've come along way since penicillin's discovery, and while antibiotics have been a blessing for millions, perhaps just about everyone on this whole planet, they've also become a possible means to our demise as a species on Earth.
Why?
Well, a few simple reasons, according to various medical accounts I've read over the years.
For starters, bacteria naturally mutates to survive, proliferate and become more effective. Like all things in nature, microscopic things evolve.
Second of all, doctors overprescribe antibiotics, plain and simple. They look in a patient's throat, see some red or something back there and prescribe a pill. Often, thanks to the litigious nature of society, the pills are prescribed for the sole purpose of reducing a medical professional's liability.
Also, and this could be the worst one, people don't take their medicine.
Imagine a bacterial illness to be something like this:
x x x x x X x x x x x x X x x x x x x x x x
OK, so you go to the doctor, and you get a diagnosis of some kind of bacterial infection, such as bronchitis, strep throat, sinus infection, etc.
You get some antibiotics, which you're supposed to take for 10 days, but after a couple of days, you're feeling 100 percent, so you blow off taking the medication.
Up until this point, the antibiotic has killed out the little x's, allowing you to feel a lot better, but it hasn't quite stomped out the big X's, or the more powerful, hard to kill platoons of the infection army. They don't exist in a number large enough to make you feel bad.
However, those big X's start multiplying, and a few even bigger, mutant X's emerge, and then you start feeling worse than ever. In effect, you've become an incubator for an even worse strain of infection, and it's going to take an even more powerful antibiotic to kill it off. Maybe you've passed it on to someone else, and if they don't take their medicine ...
Albeit an oversimplified explanation of what goes on, it paints a scary portrait of why antibiotics someday will become ineffective, thereby threatening civilization as we know it.
So, for the sake of humanity, the next time the doctor prescribes you an antibiotic, by all means save help save the planet by following the instructions!
The process took a couple of weeks, following my son's bought with bronchitis, but by mid-morning yesterday, I realized that this ailment in my system was just going to get worse.
I soldier through the early part of the day and then raced over to the clinic after taking my temperature, scoring an impressive 102.
An hour or so later, I emerged from the doctor visit with some heavy-duty antibiotics, a sore butt and a diagnosis of some nasty bronchitis.
However, within hours after the poked my behind with the alarmingly sized Cajun spice injector-sized syringe, delivering what the doctor called one of the most powerful antibiotics ever invented, I felt incrementally better as the evening progressed and even entertained the idea of a glass of wine. I ultimately opted for another big cup of water mixed with a little lemon juice, apple juice and Pediatlyte. (Try it sometime. It's pretty good!)
Today, I'm back at my desk, feeling about 98 percent and ready to take my wife out to dinner for some Mexican food.
Nevertheless, the antibiotic administration got me to thinking, and worrying, about our increasing inability to fight off bacterial infections. Stories abound about the ever-increasing bacterial strains out there.
Scientists work like crazy to stay ahead of the wave, but some day, something is going along and pose a threat to all of humanity, some superbacteria for which there is no cure.
The first antibiotic, penicillin, was discovered in 1929. Here is the story, according to http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk/bto/microbes/penicill.htm :
"The antibacterial effect of penicillin was discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1929. He noted that a fungal colony had grown as a contaminant on an agar plate streaked with the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, and that the bacterial colonies around the fungus were transparent, because their cells were lysing. Fleming had devoted much of his career to finding methods for treating wound infections, and immediately recognised the importance of a fungal metabolite that might be used to control bacteria. The substance was named penicillin, because the fungal contaminant was identified as Penicillium notatum. Fleming found that it was effective against many Gram positive bacteria in laboratory conditions, and he even used locally applied, crude preparations of this substance, from culture filtrates, to control eye infections. However, he could not purify this compound because of its instability, and it was not until the period of the Second World War (1939-1945) that two other British scientists, Florey and Chain, working in the USA, managed to produce the antibiotic on an industrial scale for widespread use. All three scientists shared the Nobel Prize for this work, and rightly so - penicillin rapidly became the "wonder drug" which saved literally millions of lives."
We've come along way since penicillin's discovery, and while antibiotics have been a blessing for millions, perhaps just about everyone on this whole planet, they've also become a possible means to our demise as a species on Earth.
Why?
Well, a few simple reasons, according to various medical accounts I've read over the years.
For starters, bacteria naturally mutates to survive, proliferate and become more effective. Like all things in nature, microscopic things evolve.
Second of all, doctors overprescribe antibiotics, plain and simple. They look in a patient's throat, see some red or something back there and prescribe a pill. Often, thanks to the litigious nature of society, the pills are prescribed for the sole purpose of reducing a medical professional's liability.
Also, and this could be the worst one, people don't take their medicine.
Imagine a bacterial illness to be something like this:
x x x x x X x x x x x x X x x x x x x x x x
OK, so you go to the doctor, and you get a diagnosis of some kind of bacterial infection, such as bronchitis, strep throat, sinus infection, etc.
You get some antibiotics, which you're supposed to take for 10 days, but after a couple of days, you're feeling 100 percent, so you blow off taking the medication.
Up until this point, the antibiotic has killed out the little x's, allowing you to feel a lot better, but it hasn't quite stomped out the big X's, or the more powerful, hard to kill platoons of the infection army. They don't exist in a number large enough to make you feel bad.
However, those big X's start multiplying, and a few even bigger, mutant X's emerge, and then you start feeling worse than ever. In effect, you've become an incubator for an even worse strain of infection, and it's going to take an even more powerful antibiotic to kill it off. Maybe you've passed it on to someone else, and if they don't take their medicine ...
Albeit an oversimplified explanation of what goes on, it paints a scary portrait of why antibiotics someday will become ineffective, thereby threatening civilization as we know it.
So, for the sake of humanity, the next time the doctor prescribes you an antibiotic, by all means save help save the planet by following the instructions!
posted by Brian Pearson at 12:55 PM
3 Comments:
Glad you are feeling better!
My kids ped wont prescribe antibiotics unless he absolutely has to because of the way these strains of bacteria mutate and become immune to the antibiotics.. And the Antibiotics stop working effectively.
Last year I was graced with that over sized cajun spice injector as well.. Feels lovely doesnt it!.. only that time it took me 3 months and 5 antibiotics to get well..
I can always count on Ivy to read my blog!
Go Ivy!
Finally my husband can get into blog reading, just today as I caught up on your blog, I read about fantasy sports, which we both participate in and antibiotics which he thinks is the biggest medical problem there is. Thanks for taking real life events and adding the history and humor we can all appreciate.
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