We've all probably taken antibiotics at some point, and given it little thought. When an illness has gone on for a little too long, these miracle drugs often seem like a harmless magic bullet, able to cure anything. Some have even called antibiotics the greatest medical advance ever. But now, public health officials are warning that our decades-long love affair with these drugs is rendering them useless. When one doesn't work, we are given another. Increasingly, however, doctors are running out of options.
"Crisis" is not too strong a word for describing what has happened to antibiotics. As our use of the drugs rises every year in the United States, bacterial resistance has risen right alongside it: there isn't a single known antibiotic to which bacteria have not become resistant.
As just one example: staphylococcus aureus, or a staph infection, has become ever harder to treat. Staph bacteria can spread like mildew in a damp basement in hospitals when equipment, clothing, or even hands aren't washed and sterilized properly. (Hospitals are loath to admit it, but this happens in every hospital in the United States -- even in the very best ones.) There was a time, a long time, when staph could be knocked out almost immediately by antibiotics. These days, there's no guarantee that any antibiotic can save you.
Every year, more than ninety thousand Americans die from similar infections that have become resistant to antibiotics. That stunning figure is higher than the death toll from AIDS, car accidents and prostate cancer combined.
Seven decades since the discovery of antibiotics, it's clear that science still cannot keep pace with bacteria. Dr. Stuart Levy, a professor of molecular biology at the Tufts School of Medicine and one of the world's leading medical authorities on antibiotics, says the cause of the crisis is not in dispute: we are simply using too many antibiotics.
And the place where this is happening most often is in the primary care office. Some of the reasons are obvious: antibiotics seem like a quick fix; doctors are frequently in a rush and it's easy to write a prescription; doctors may think it's better to be "safe than sorry." But Dr. Rita Mangione-Smith, an investigator at the Seattle Children's Hospital Research Institute, says the real reasons are more subtle than that. "When a physician believes a parent wants an antibiotic, they are significantly more likely to inappropriately prescribe," she said. And that has a lot to do with American consumer culture, and the view of patients as "customers." "There's a huge amount of concern among physicians that their patients have high levels of satisfaction," said Mangione-Smith. Otherwise, "they'll leave your practice and go somewhere else."
And people aren't the only ones taking too many antibiotics. About seventy percent of all antibiotics purchased in the United States are for farm animals, which are fed these drugs by the ton in order to help them to grow faster. But bacteria in animals can develop resistance just like in humans, and this resistance can spread into the community.
But while the threat of resistance continues to escalate in the U.S., HDNet's "Dan Rather Reports" program found a different tact in Norway. That country some time ago embarked on a nationwide education and regulation drive to greatly reduce antibiotic use for both people and animals. Norwegian doctors boast that patients there use just one-third of the antibiotics, per person, as Americans do. In real world terms, that's making a huge difference: Norway has the lowest rate of antibiotic resistant infections in the developed world.
This demonstrates, Norwegian specialists say, what can -- and must -- be done. Bacteria's winning momentum in the war against antibiotics can be reversed, but only if the world acts, and acts quickly.
Dan Rather Reports airs Tuesdays on HDNet at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/articles-health/32271
http://medizoneint.com/medizone-international%E2%80%99s-mass-market-sterilization-technology-to-be-produced-by-canadian-medical-device-heavyweights/
If livestock are getting sick at an alarming rate, how about improve the conditions so that it happens at a much lower rate. Maybe we need a different food source? There has to be a good solution.
Cutting back care on humans so agribusiness can keep supersize cows is not my idea of a proper solution.
Advanced antibiotics are administered in hospitals. Yet how can germs mutate in hospitals? Aren't hospitals supposed to be antiseptic with no germs?
They are supposed to be, but they are not. Administrators cut costs on cleaning. They rely on antibiotics instead. I once had reason to visit the ****** University Emergency Room twice about a week apart. There were small speck of blood on the wall that were not washed off over a week's time at this supposedly world class hospital.
If we wish to solve this problem, we need to limit the environmental exposure to antibiotics, not the human exposure. That means last line antibiotics need to be used in sterile environments with patient wastes, including antibiotic packaging, incinerated.
Oh, and don't let livestock dump tons of bioactive manure all over the countryside.
When you say “Yet how can germs mutate in hospitals? Aren't hospitals supposed to be antiseptic with no germs? “Well in hospitals germs are everywhere, and because an hospital is constantly cleaned (it should be but as you said, it's not always the case) bacteria are putted under pressure. Only the strongest ones or the ones that have been able to mutate and become more resistant can survive. A recent survey shows that at least a third of these nosocomial infections could be avoided and even 50% if all the medics would carry a hand sanitizer with them at all time. This method has been tested in the Geneva Hospital in Switzerland and showed great results.
My other point is about animals. The main problem is that most of the animals are fed every single day with antibiotics. To avoid a rapid spread of a disease (because they parked by hundreds in a small and closed environment) and thus a great loss of profit. But antibiotics stay in the meat and obviously finish their journey in our stomach. That means that most of us get a small dose of antibiotics every day! We definitely need to react quickly and strongly. And that means eating less meat and choosing only the high quality (same for fishes).
Thanks you again for your interesting post.
Regards.
Pierre
Peace on Earth,
Ik
The word is out with pediatricians, family practitioners and hospitals, so patients shouldn't be asking for antibiotics to treat illnesses which are more likely to be viral in origin. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Medicine and the CDC, which are readily available through the internet have excellent user-friendly sites about proper prescribing of antibiotics.
If your physician prescribes an antibiotic you should take the full course of treatment...even past the time when you are "feeling better", so that the bacterial infection is wiped out and your don't require another course of treatment with a more powerful antibiotic...and so that you don't transmit an antibiotic-resistant bacteria to anyone else. Patient non-compliance with the rather long course of treatment for Tuberculosis, resulted in multi-drug-resistant TB in community settings. Patient antibiotic non-compliance results in other serious community-acquired drug resistant bacterial illnesses.
I have noticed among my own family members, being prescribed antibiotics for colds and other minor ailments. This has got to stop and perhaps the new healthcare law will offer us a mechanism to address this issue.
Ever since my folks gave you information that catapulted 60 Minutes into a phenomenae, I have had a good opinion of you. I still do but I am disappointed you would include the misleading information concerning antibiotic use in animals in this report. It simply gives people a villain to chase rather than addressing the real issues in how we use antibiotics and the inherent risks involved in living in our modern world.
After going through this for awhile, I said there is a problem,and it must be the antibiotics.I was on the strongest one they made.I said it must be killing my immune system, my body isn't capable of fighting off any infection.
I made up my mind then,I refuse to take anymore antibiotics unless it is life threating.I take allergy medication for my bronchitis.It's allergy related to molds and mildew.
When I get sick I let my own body fight off the infections,so far it has been able to do that for the last 8 years.When your body is trying to tell you something,like with the antibiotics,it is best to listen to it.It is telling you for a reason.
Our high calorie, refined diets lead to low volume stools, prolonged transit times and persistent physical efforts during defecation - notably in preterm infants and postmenopausal women. Persistent straining during defecation injures epithelial surfaces rendering them more susceptible to recurrent pathological and opportunist infections (Straub, 2008). We then pack the most vulnerable, infected individuals - with chronic diseases - into dangerous institutions (hospitals) and wonder why we have a problem with recurrent and untreatable infections.
The bugs will win unless we change our diets, bowel habits and injurious patterns of childbirth - urgently.
It is a crises and the overuse must stop.
Remove the subsidies to use antibiotics in every stockyard and factory farm and you'll help the situation more than anything else you can do.
A leading hospital in the US has the protocol of every worker washing his or her hands after entering AND exiting patient areas, in order to combat MRSA. Glove use in patient areas after such washing occurs, whether or not direct patient interaction occurs, also is mandatory. It's sad to note such efforts are done more to minimize the hospital's risk than to affect patient health, but at least there is that ancillary benefit present for patients and staff.
The list goes on and companies like Medizone International are on a new frontier to stop these problems. The ozone base AsepticSure is one of the answers and people really need to start becoming aware of what is out there as far as new technologies and support them.
If you don't believe me just check out the link and read yourself.
http://medizoneint.com/
People would come into our ER with the sniffles and demand antibiotics. Antibiotics have a very limited use and only where there is an infection that warrants being treated aggressively.
Overuse of antibiotics has opened the door to infections that cannot be cured. MRSA is on the rise and frequently surgery is the only way to get rid of it. A doctor came and got me one night and showed me a patient's hand. There was an ugly black and oozing area close to his index finger and thumb..right hand. He was sent to OR. The next day when I got to work the patient was standing outside. (hooked up to an IV pole and smoking ) He had a huge bandage on his right hand. Surgeons had to remove 3/4 of his hand to get rid of the MRSA.
MRSA a poses a threat in any hospital. Professionals who do not wash their hands before touching a patient can pass any number of infections on. At one time we had 6 patients on the second floor with MRSA.
Don't ask for antibiotics and if the doctor says he is prescribing them, ask him if they are necessary. Some doctors are too quick to prescribe antibiotics.
I got Rocky Mountain Spotted Tick Fever in 2001 and made the horrible mistake of telling a young doctor what I had. Evidently I really p-ed him off because I could not get well. I saw an internist and he exploded and said the ER doc gave me half the dosage that is traditionally prescribed. I had headaches and vertigo and an MRI was ordered and I had two brain lesions.
Here it is 2011 and last fall, I fell. Headaches started. It hit me that my symptoms were the same as 2001. I went to ER that night because my head hurt so much. MRI..I have 3 brain lesions now and they are blaming it on the half-dosage of antibiotics that I was given in 2001. .
We're damned if we do and damned if we don't .Lesson learned, I'll never tell another doctor "my" diagnosis. :-)
I am going to keep you in my thoughts and tell your story to my family and friends so we can get some good and positive vibes coming to you.
If the Zpac doesn't work, though, surgery may be a good idea. Don't wait like I did, and spend 3 days inpatient.