Running out of treatments: The problem superbugs resistant to everything

“Doctors in many countries have gone back to using old antibiotics that were abandoned 20 years ago because their toxic side effects were so frequent and so bad”, says Professor Matthew Falagas from the Alfa Institute of Biomedical Sciences in Athens, Greece and Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts. “But superbugs like Acinetobacter have challenged doctors all over the world by now becoming resistant to these older and considered more dangerous medicines”.

“Even colistin, a polymyxin type antibiotic discovered 60 years ago, has recently been used as a salvage remedy to treat patients with Acinetobacter infections”, says Professor Falagas. “And it was successful for a while, but now it occasionally fails due to recent extensive use that has caused the bacteria to become resistant, leading to problem superbugs which are pan-drug resistant, in other words resistant to all available antibiotics”.

The Greek researchers have also shown in new data analyses that Acinetobacter is a more serious threat than previously thought – it doesn’t just cause severe infections, it kills many more patients than doctors had realised. Acinetobacter can cause pneumonia, skin and wound infections and in some cases meningitis.

The scientists have also identified a whole range of drug resistant strategies being used by the bacteria, including the production of compounds which can inactivate the drug treatments, cell pumps that can bail out the drug molecules from inside bacterial cells making them ineffective, and mutating the drug target sites making the drug molecules miss or fail to latch onto the specific regions of the bacterial cells that they were aiming for.

“There have already been severe problems with critically ill patients due to Acinetobacter baumannii infections in various countries”, says Matthew Falagas. “In some cases we have simply run out of treatments and we could be facing a pandemic with important public health implications”.

Source: Society for General Microbiology

Fast way of spotting multidrug resistant bacteria could help stop outbreaks in hospitals
A type of bacterium widely found on our skin and in the environment has now become a major threat in hospitals where it can cause serious infections, such as pneumonia in severely ill patients. Like the well known bacterium MRSA (methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus) the new types of Acinetobacter baumannii are resistant to nearly all antibiotics, so doctors have very few treatments available, and three resistant strains are currently circulating in the UK.
Military bacteria mystery may be solved
A rare drug-resistant bacterium has spread throughout U.S. military hospitals around the world, killing at least 27 since the start of the Iraq war.
New Way to Target and Kill Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria Found
Putting bacteria on birth control could stop the spread of drug-resistant microbes, and researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have found a way to do just that.
US soldiers in Iraq fighting drug-resistant bacteria after injuries
US soldiers in Iraq do not carry the bacteria responsible for difficult-to-treat wound infections found in military hospitals treating soldiers wounded in Iraq, according to an article to be published electronically on Wednesday, May 16, 2007, in Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology. The article will appear in the June issue of the journal.
Battling cancer, one cell at a time
New research suggests that the identification and examination of key cell signaling events required for initiation and progression of cancer might be best accomplished at the single cell level. The research, published by Cell Press in the October issue of the journal Cancer Cell, provides new insight that may lead to better diagnosis and treatment of some complex cancers.
Technology elite use Internet to fight TB
Acclaimed photojournalist James Nachtwey's dream of using images to marshal arms in the battle against tuberculosis is coming true with the help of technology titans.
Nutritionists show what beans are worth
Consider a natural alternative the next time you reach for that cupcake or soda as an afternoon snack. This snack leaves you feeling full, gives you energy, and simultaneously fights “bad”—LDL—cholesterol.
Breast cancer cells recycle to escape death by hormonal therapy
Many breast cancer cells facing potentially lethal antiestrogen therapy recycle to survive, researchers say.

Running out of treatments: The problem superbugs resistant to everything

Related stories:

News discussion: