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Yeah, that was my first reaction too... Surely only using it in cases where other antibiotics hadn't proven successful would be a better approach so that you d
by balabaster 12y ago
Yeah, that was my first reaction too...
Surely only using it in cases where other antibiotics hadn't proven successful would be a better approach so that you don't give bacteria much opportunity to become resistant.
Broad use of antibiotics in cases where it wasn't needed is exactly how we got into this problem in the first place.
Perhaps learning from history would be the most prudent approach.
- learc83 12y agoAntibiotic resistance has a fitness penalty. If we switch to this new antibiotic for long enough, bacteria may lose their resistance to our current antibiotics. I'm assuming their suggestion is to use this drug for the next 30 years, and by the time bacteria become resistant to it we can start using our old antibiotics again.
- Fomite 12y agoAntibiotic resistance does not necessarily have a strong fitness penalty - the spread of community-resistant MRSA is largely in environments where there isn't strong selective pressure against susceptible strains.
- tezza 12y agoI think some in depth academic research would be required to determine the optimal strategy. Intuitive strategies may not be as good as some counter-intuitive options. I'm not qualified to answer either way, I imagine several people could get PhDs finding out. It's too important to handle quickly