3 ms·
Huge costs and virtually no gain. A good antibiotic is used during a short term. Furthermore if things go on like today it will probably be destroyed within ye
by etiam 13y ago
Huge costs and virtually no gain.
A good antibiotic is used during a short term.
Furthermore if things go on like today it will probably be destroyed within years by short-sighted, irresponsible use like fattening cattle.
Any pharmaceutical company suicidal enough to start development with those odds will probably have put itself out of business long ago already.
This is an existential threat in many ways. Infections we shrug at today are going back to being life-threatening. And it isn't just infectious medicine that's losing power by this. Surgery, for example, get vastly more dangerous, difficult and expensive if there isn't effective antibiotics; in some cases downright impossible.
I think you are right about public funding to the research and expect to see it rise. Where I would really like intergovernmental cooperation is in making sure the new antibiotics are used in a responsible, sustainable way.
Routine use like an agricultural food additive should be a felony as far as I'm concerned, and even when used for curing serious disease it should be high priority making sure cures are completed and risk of transmitting resistant bacteria is minimal. We have to protect antibiotics effectively if there is to be much point in developing new ones.
- hga 13y ago"Furthermore if things go on like today it will probably be destroyed within years by short-sighted, irresponsible use like fattening cattle." Which of course explains the widespread use of vancomycin for that purpose. Seriously, while this use of antibiotics is problematic, there's no evidence it's a big problem today---if there was it would be written in flaming letters across the sky. "Where I would really like intergovernmental cooperation is in making sure the new antibiotics are used in a responsible, sustainable way." How does this work? What happens to a bad actor who doesn't care or just can't get its act together?
- cabalamat 13y ago> How does this work? What happens to a bad actor who doesn't care or just can't get its act together? Governments could refuse entry to people who've visited that country.
- hga 13y agoAnd do what at the borders, many if not most of which are porous?
- rwallace 13y agoThe vast majority of people moving between countries pass openly through airports or border checkpoints where they could be turned back. Yes, there are illegal immigrants and drug traffickers who sneak across the desert or dodge the Coast Guard in motorboats, but they represent an insignificant fraction of total human traffic and opportunities for carrying antibiotic-resistant disease.