tagged w/ Drug Resistance
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The arms race between humanity and disease-causing bacteria is drawing to a close—and the bacteria are winning. The latest evidence: gonorrhea is becoming resistant to all standard antibiotic treatment.
Gonorrhea is one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases in the world—with about 600,000 cases diagnosed in the U.S. each year. A few years ago, investigators started seeing cases of infection that did not easily respond to treatment with a group of drugs called cephalosporins, which are currently the last line of defense against this particular infection. Now, the number of drug-resistant cases has grown so much in the U.S. and elsewhere that gonorrheal infection may soon become untreatable, according to doctors writing in the February 9 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
(more at link)The arms race between humanity and disease-causing bacteria is drawing to a... more
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Pharmacies around the country are offering free antibiotics to cash-strapped consumers, but public health officials say the incentives send the wrong message and could worsen the problem of drug resistance.
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent out letters to several pharmacies urging them to promote responsible use of antibiotics to their customers. Currently, several pharmacies including Giant Food Stores, Stop & Shop, Wegmans Food Markets, Publix, Meijer and ShopRite are offering free antibiotics to customers who have a prescription from their doctor.
“We don’t want to discourage companies from providing low-cost medications to their consumers,” said Dr. Lauri Hicks, medical director for the C.D.C.’s “Get Smart Program,” which offers educational materials about appropriate antibiotic use. “If a patient believes that they can get an antibiotic quite easily or for free, then it may increase the pressure on health care providers to prescribe it.”
The generic antibiotics included in the free programs are relatively inexpensive compared to other drugs, in part because they typically are used for limited periods and are not refilled. Pharmacies have adopted the programs to promote customer loyalty and compete for the business of major retailers like Wal-Mart.Pharmacies around the country are offering free antibiotics to cash-strapped... more
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Warmer temperatures are at least partly to blame for a surge in malaria in East Africa and the increase in drug-resistant strains of the disease, according to a University of Michigan researcher.
The malaria parasite is highly sensitive to changes in temperature, and even subtle warming can dramatically increase populations of the mosquitoes that transmit the disease, said ecologist Mercedes Pascual.
Some scientists have argued that climate is not involved in the increasing highland epidemics. Instead, they say, adaptations in the parasite that make it resistant to anti-malarial drugs are the key drivers.
But Pascual said that this "either-or" view is misguided and improperly lets global warming off the hook.
"I think that’s a useless discussion," she said.
More likely, Pascual said, the two work in tandem to an effect greater than the sum of their parts, with rising temperatures leading to faster development of drug resistance.
"The literature has this controversy of 'Is it climate or is it drug resistance?' and drug resistance is taken as evidence that we don’t need to invoke climate change," she added.Warmer temperatures are at least partly to blame for a surge in malaria in East Africa... more
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