Dawn of a post-antibiotic era?
Hello everyone,
I’ve read a couple articles recently about a new strand of bacteria called mcr-1. This bacteria is quite worrisome due to its immunity to polymyxin drugs and how easily transferable it is, even to non-related bacteria. I’ve summarized the articles below and I’ll post the links to them.
While doing routine testing of food-market bound animals, scientists discovered a gene in bacteria that lives on pigs which gives Escherichia coli (E. Coli) resistance to polymyxin drugs (medicine used as a last resort if modern antibiotics are ineffective or are contraindicated). These drugs have been in use for about sixty years and have been able to maintain their effectiveness due to their seldom use. This new gene is called mcr-1 and is easily transferable, even among unrelated bacteria. Experts are saying this could be the dawn of a post-antibiotic era. Common infections that used to be easily treatable could, once again, become incurable and even fatal. The researchers are now recommending against using the same antibiotics to treat both humans and farm animals as this could increase the speed of antibiotic resistance.
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/nov/18/antibiotic-defences-against-serious-diseases-under-threat-experts-warn
http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/bacteria-found-resistance-antibiotic-typically-used-when-all-others-fail