Post by account_disabled on Mar 4, 2024 2:04:48 GMT -5
Superbacteria CSIC researchers analyze the use of bacteriophages to confront the threat posed by the growing resistance of bacteria to drugs virus Newtribuna While we are still immersed in the coronavirus pandemic , some worrying data announce with increasing clarity the proximity of another, perhaps quieter but no less threatening: the dissemination of “superbacteria” resistant to the entire antibiotic arsenal available. nowadays. In reality, the increasing emergence of bacterial strains resistant to certain antibiotics has been occurring for decades, but only in recent years have some bacterial pathogens become practically pan-resistant. Furthermore, it has been observed that during this pandemic period the consumption of some antibiotics has skyrocketed and, in parallel, so has the rate of resistant bacteria. This gloomy panorama has caused an alert by the World Health Organization (WHO) through its action plan against antibiotic resistance.
This sense, a few days ago "European day for the prudent use of antibiotics" was celebrated, which continues in Spain with other campaigns that have the same message: using antibiotics rationally and avoiding their abuse, the main factor of the increase in resistance. While other causes of death in the world are being combated with some success, those caused by these multi-resistant bacteria, and those that are expected in Australia Phone Number the coming years, are faced with increasing alarm and even pessimism. This is fundamentally because large pharmaceutical companies have withdrawn, in recent years, a large part of their investments in new antibacterial drugs. The result is that, not without reason, the health authorities seem to have agreed to sound the alarm with the threatening numbers of deaths expected in the coming decades "if the situation continues like this and there are no other treatments.
But this analysis does not usually go beyond whether alternative solutions are really envisioned. And yet, today it can be clearly stated that there are promising treatments based, for example, on the use of bacteriophage viruses, or phages for short, which is known as “phage therapy” or phage therapy. Phages, discovered just over a century ago, are viruses that exclusively infect bacteria. They are the most abundant biological entities on the planet and, furthermore, the dominant predators in the biosphere, usually found in large numbers even alongside the microbiota that inhabits our body. In general, its life cycle involves the lysis and death of the host bacteria and, for this reason, its therapeutic application to combat some infections was adopted, at least experimentally, very shortly after its discovery (remember, more than a year ago). century). However, the discovery of penicillin.
This sense, a few days ago "European day for the prudent use of antibiotics" was celebrated, which continues in Spain with other campaigns that have the same message: using antibiotics rationally and avoiding their abuse, the main factor of the increase in resistance. While other causes of death in the world are being combated with some success, those caused by these multi-resistant bacteria, and those that are expected in Australia Phone Number the coming years, are faced with increasing alarm and even pessimism. This is fundamentally because large pharmaceutical companies have withdrawn, in recent years, a large part of their investments in new antibacterial drugs. The result is that, not without reason, the health authorities seem to have agreed to sound the alarm with the threatening numbers of deaths expected in the coming decades "if the situation continues like this and there are no other treatments.
But this analysis does not usually go beyond whether alternative solutions are really envisioned. And yet, today it can be clearly stated that there are promising treatments based, for example, on the use of bacteriophage viruses, or phages for short, which is known as “phage therapy” or phage therapy. Phages, discovered just over a century ago, are viruses that exclusively infect bacteria. They are the most abundant biological entities on the planet and, furthermore, the dominant predators in the biosphere, usually found in large numbers even alongside the microbiota that inhabits our body. In general, its life cycle involves the lysis and death of the host bacteria and, for this reason, its therapeutic application to combat some infections was adopted, at least experimentally, very shortly after its discovery (remember, more than a year ago). century). However, the discovery of penicillin.