http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN0T739620151118

You guys might remember the infected colonoscopy scopes that left them in critical condition and 3 (going from memory) died from, the infection that killed 10+ in a London hospital a short time after that. Both those were due to the ndm1 plasmid that is highly transmissible among gram negative specimens. In short it confers resistance to the vast majority of antibiotics currently on the market (generation 5 cephalosporins having VERY modest success). We worry about the over prescription of antibiotics in America and the repercussions they might have. While this is well and true, we sometimes forget what the rest of the world is doing. Blame of how ndm1 first came on to the scene is still contested but it is consensus that it came from either India or England where antibiotic prescriptions are under far less scrutiny. The Swedish were the first to publish it and it was an Indian patient so they named it ndm1 (New Delhi metalloprotease 1). Regardless of where it came from, it's here now. As far as I'm aware this is the first news I have heard about bacteria harboring this plasmid asymtompatically colonizing a person's flora.

Imo this issue is a very threatening global issue that gets modest press. In short if you become infected with this (more than a carrier state) then there is statistically a 92% chance you will die from it. It's an interesting issue because there isn't a way a single country can protect against it. Like climate change it truly is a global issue. I'll post a figure on when the plasmid first was identified, how it was spread, and how many paitients died per year, but it has increased exponentially over the past 5 years. It is an issue we will hear about more as time passes. I'm uncertain as to how effective the who is, but if they are as ineffective as the UN this will be a huge problem.

Sorry, I had to.

Antibiotic resistance is probably the biggest threat facing us right now, not sure why everyone seems to have their heads buried in the sand. But imo it's fighting a losing battle when Ian the Indian is only interested in keeping himself and his family afloat financially, livestock systems all over the globe are breeding factories for these kinds of things.

Bacteriophage therapy is the way forward

Eh realistic vs these bugs right now are carbapenems but that class has its own disadvantages as well. I thought I read an article about them being covered by 5th gen cephalosporins but it seems like I might have been incorrect about that.

Nevertheless, experimental and new drugs will have their role but they won't be accessible for the masses.

This post was edited by Bazi on Nov 18 2015 10:13pm

They will be accessible for the wealthy masses, while things like intellectual property make a bucket of aids medicine, costing a couple bucks to make, out of reach for the vast majority of the world's citizens, due to the profit motive and thugs making sure other people don't create anything similar through law.

No, the first step is assertive governments loyal to their people not being cowards in the face of economic imperialism and dispelling the inappropriate notions of non-existent intellectual property that for some reason we are pretending is something we have to respect more than actual existing people who need medicine.

Even if a magic bullet was made to make everyone better and there was enough for everyone, some capitalist will come along and fuck up the distribution so bad that ten people have everything and a hundred people are in misery.

This post was edited by Skinned on Nov 19 2015 06:15am

I'm of the opinion that research into new antibiotics should be discouraged in favour of research into novel, living biological agents, such as phage. Purely because if we can get it to work as effectively, it's going to be much more long-lasting than a new class of antibiotics.

You realize the concept behind phage therapy is that it helps to diminish antibiotic resistance in target specimens. You still need an antibiotic for it to work. Phages are not a magic answer.

Anyway if what you proposed occurred full tilt people with simple UTIs would be dead because ceftriaxone (3rd gen cephalo) and like antibiotics would not exist and bugs are already widely resistant to earlier gens like cefozitin. Your theory sounds alright in theory, but in reality it would lead to a large avoidable loss of life. The only option is for the two to be worked on simultaneously. Also you're under the impression that work on past antibiotics slows down work on novel approaches which is not necessarily true. Labs that have been churning out old gen upgrades can do so in efficient manners.

This post was edited by Bazi on Nov 19 2015 07:17am

I cannot really disagree with anything you wrote. My fear is that the magic bullet we desperately seek won't occur and instead we'll get a pellet that sometimes work and most often doesn't. In this scenario, how does the world, or individual countries rather, act in face of this situation. Nation wide restrictions based on anyone testing positive? It would not be a foolproof way because I genuinely don't think it will be long until a good chunk of people are colonized, it's already starting. Do you act based off plasmid loads then (helping to differentiate between colonized demographic vs. active infection)? Tricky scenario

Coincidentally, ever read The Masque of the Red Death?

We are all going to die, no matter what.

There is no escape.

This post was edited by Skinned on Nov 19 2015 07:50am

...pretty much the same we talked about for the first few years of the HIV/AIDS epidemic .