3 ms·

A woman dies of a superbug resistant to every available antibiotic in the US

61 points by happy-go-lucky 10y ago

sergiotapia 10y ago
Next step is hopefully programmable nanobots. They use their tiny laser blasters to surgically kill $BAD_CELLS. Lots of examples of public research online: http://www.sciencealert.com/new-light-activated-nanoparticles-kill-over-90-of-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria http://www.sciencealert.com/new-light-activated-nanoparticle... Imagine what's military-grade and secret right now. The future is bright!
- micaksica 10y ago
  > Imagine what's military-grade and secret right now. I don't think this rule of thumb for technological advancement has held true since the Cold War. Whatever nanobots are military grade and secret are likely shitty prototypes that have cost billions over what was expected.
mablap 10y ago
https://hn.algolia.com/?query=superbug&sort=byPopularity&prefix=false&page=0&dateRange=pastMonth&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=superbug&sort=byPopularity&pre... This story has been posted a handful of times now. See link for other discussions ^.
kgdinesh 10y ago
And so it begins...
- atmosx 10y ago
  Nothing really new for the pharmaceutical community tbh. The MRSA - which is probably the most well known superbug - has been around for years and claimed more deaths than AIDS per year in the US last time I checked. There was an article pointing out that a techniques based on combination of ATBs + Bacteriophages might be a possible replacement. Another possible counter-measure is nano-tech. If states do not jump-in funding various research groups, it's highly unlikely that humanity will be given another "Aha!" moment a-la Fleming.
huhtenberg 10y ago
From yesterday - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13391886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13391886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13402726 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13402726
piyush_soni 10y ago
I don't know why, but I have a faint hope that some day AI and Machine learning will help solve these problems. Problems like these, and selectively killing cancer cells. Of course, just a hope.
- balls187 10y ago
  1 person out of 300,000,000 has died that's linked to drug resistant superbug. Hardly a problem. Of course AI could also just solve the problem by killing anyone who has superbugs, so that the spread of such things is eradicated.
  - onion2k 10y ago
    Of course AI could also just solve the problem by killing anyone who has superbugs, so that the spread of such things is eradicated. That wouldn't work if the infectious stage of contamination comes before any obvious symptoms present themselves. Certainly in the case of colds and influenza the symptoms that make you look/feel unwell come days after you've been passing it to other people.
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      Relevant: https://xkcd.com/1612/ https://xkcd.com/1612/, especially alt-text: "The contagious period ends right around when you start to sound sick over the phone, which is probably evidence of cold viruses evolving to spread optimally in the workplace.".
  - TomAnthony 10y ago
    The article mentions that this isn't the first such case. It is just a more recent example. Furthermore, there are multiple examples of bacteria that are resistant to families of antibiotics, which indicates the direction of the trend. If we don't consider it a problem now, when should we?
    - arviewer 10y ago
      > If we don't consider it a problem now, when should we? What we should, does not matter. When it starts to cost money, or when there is an opportunity to earn money, then things will change.
balls187 10y ago
Let's be clear here, she was in her 70's and received a majority of her care in India, not the US.
- nrjdhsbsid 10y ago
  And she had a bone infection, very hard to treat even without resistant bacteria. Let's be realistic here, she had the infection for YEARS... The odds are very high that the bacteria started out fairly normal and became resistant over time
barrystaes 10y ago
Bacteria are called bugs now? This calls for action.
anon363764 10y ago
Necessary knee-jerking wake-up call: Antibiotics should be rationed, those prescribed (after culturing) must be assured they are taken by some automatic/interactive means and it should be a felony to pill-mill them for a cold; otherwise, without rapid r&d, we're going to lose the survival arms race.
- k__ 10y ago
  I saw a few articles last year that said something about new meds that can replace antibiotics (or are even better antibiotics, I don't know), but they aren't approved yet. As far as I understand it, the problem here isn't that we lose an arms race because we don't have alternatives, but because of our approval systems. When enough antibiotics lost their effects, laws will probably be changed OR it will take long enough till we got the alternatives in the marked.

Next step is hopefully programmable nanobots. They use their tiny laser blasters to surgically kill $BAD_CELLS. Lots of examples of public research online: http://www.sciencealert.com/new-light-activated-nanoparticles-kill-over-90-of-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria http://www.sciencealert.com/new-light-activated-nanoparticle... Imagine what's military-grade and secret right now. The future is bright!

micaksica 10y ago
> Imagine what's military-grade and secret right now. I don't think this rule of thumb for technological advancement has held true since the Cold War. Whatever nanobots are military grade and secret are likely shitty prototypes that have cost billions over what was expected.

mablap 10y ago

https://hn.algolia.com/?query=superbug&sort=byPopularity&prefix=false&page=0&dateRange=pastMonth&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=superbug&sort=byPopularity&pre... This story has been posted a handful of times now. See link for other discussions ^.

kgdinesh 10y ago

And so it begins...

atmosx 10y ago
Nothing really new for the pharmaceutical community tbh. The MRSA - which is probably the most well known superbug - has been around for years and claimed more deaths than AIDS per year in the US last time I checked. There was an article pointing out that a techniques based on combination of ATBs + Bacteriophages might be a possible replacement. Another possible counter-measure is nano-tech. If states do not jump-in funding various research groups, it's highly unlikely that humanity will be given another "Aha!" moment a-la Fleming.

huhtenberg 10y ago

From yesterday - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13391886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13391886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13402726 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13402726

piyush_soni 10y ago

I don't know why, but I have a faint hope that some day AI and Machine learning will help solve these problems. Problems like these, and selectively killing cancer cells. Of course, just a hope.

balls187 10y ago
1 person out of 300,000,000 has died that's linked to drug resistant superbug. Hardly a problem. Of course AI could also just solve the problem by killing anyone who has superbugs, so that the spread of such things is eradicated.
- onion2k 10y ago
  Of course AI could also just solve the problem by killing anyone who has superbugs, so that the spread of such things is eradicated. That wouldn't work if the infectious stage of contamination comes before any obvious symptoms present themselves. Certainly in the case of colds and influenza the symptoms that make you look/feel unwell come days after you've been passing it to other people.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    Relevant: https://xkcd.com/1612/ https://xkcd.com/1612/, especially alt-text: "The contagious period ends right around when you start to sound sick over the phone, which is probably evidence of cold viruses evolving to spread optimally in the workplace.".
- TomAnthony 10y ago
  The article mentions that this isn't the first such case. It is just a more recent example. Furthermore, there are multiple examples of bacteria that are resistant to families of antibiotics, which indicates the direction of the trend. If we don't consider it a problem now, when should we?
  - arviewer 10y ago
    > If we don't consider it a problem now, when should we? What we should, does not matter. When it starts to cost money, or when there is an opportunity to earn money, then things will change.

balls187 10y ago

Let's be clear here, she was in her 70's and received a majority of her care in India, not the US.

nrjdhsbsid 10y ago
And she had a bone infection, very hard to treat even without resistant bacteria. Let's be realistic here, she had the infection for YEARS... The odds are very high that the bacteria started out fairly normal and became resistant over time

barrystaes 10y ago

Bacteria are called bugs now? This calls for action.

anon363764 10y ago

Necessary knee-jerking wake-up call: Antibiotics should be rationed, those prescribed (after culturing) must be assured they are taken by some automatic/interactive means and it should be a felony to pill-mill them for a cold; otherwise, without rapid r&d, we're going to lose the survival arms race.

k__ 10y ago
I saw a few articles last year that said something about new meds that can replace antibiotics (or are even better antibiotics, I don't know), but they aren't approved yet. As far as I understand it, the problem here isn't that we lose an arms race because we don't have alternatives, but because of our approval systems. When enough antibiotics lost their effects, laws will probably be changed OR it will take long enough till we got the alternatives in the marked.