Doomer Doug
TB Fanatic
I have to say the medical implications of the total failure of modern antibiotics to deal with disease are severe. What would happen if we had no functional antibiotics to treat certain diseases or bacteria? It would mean everybody who got TB would eventually die. It would mean the billions of dollars invested in physical medical infrastructure, like hospitals, clinics would have to written off. Assuming you can't treat staph infections for example, and one broke out in a hospital: YOU WOULD HAVE TO BURN IT TO THE GROUND TO DESTROY THE BACTERIA YOU COULD NO LONGER TREAT WITH ANY ANTIBIOTIC.
We face a lot of different health/disaster/disease issues like Ebola or AIDS. Still, if modern society ever gets to the point it is unable to treat bacteria with antibiotics it would mean hundreds of thousands, possibly several million people would die from diseases we now routinely treat with antibiotics.
Yep, what would happen if Pestis, the bacteria responsible for the Black Death, was no longer treatable by any antibiotic. Even now, we still get a few cases of Black Death around the world. We keep it pounded down with antibiotics, limit its spread and control it more or less.
If New York City ever had an outbreak, was unable to treat it, it would see, especially with the airborne version, an explosion of cases.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-heavy-use-medication-making-ineffective.html
Antibiotic-resistant bugs may soon make routine operations 'impossible': Research shows 'catastrophic' evidence that use heavy use of medication is making it ineffective
Researcher found evidence vital medication is becoming ineffective
Over using antibiotics has led to a build up of bacterial resistance
Cancer sufferers and women having C-sections face added risk of infection
By Daily Mail Reporter
Published: 18:11 EST, 15 October 2015 | Updated: 18:37 EST, 15 October 2015
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ication-making-ineffective.html#ixzz3ogbMYjv7
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Routine operations could become ‘virtually impossible’ without urgent action to tackle the threat posed by antibiotic resistance, a study has found.
Researchers have uncovered ‘catastrophic’ evidence that the vital medication is gradually becoming ineffective because it has been so heavily used.
Cancer sufferers, women having caesareans and even patients undergoing simple surgical procedures are developing deadly infections which cannot be cured by antibiotics.
Researchers from Washington warned that if the crisis of antibiotic resistance is not tackled urgently, common types of surgery and chemotherapy will become impossible
Researchers from Washington warned that if the crisis of antibiotic resistance is not tackled urgently, common types of surgery and chemotherapy will become impossible
In a study spanning more than 40 years, researchers found that half of patients who contract an infection after surgery cannot be treated with standard antibiotics.
The same is true for 39 per cent of women who develop an infection after a caesarean and 27 per cent of those following chemotherapy.
Researchers from Washington warned that if the crisis of antibiotic resistance is not tackled urgently, common types of surgery and chemotherapy will become impossible.
They calculate that if the effectiveness of antibiotics were to drop by less than a third, there would be 120,000 more infections and 6,300 deaths in the USA a year.
They did not provide estimates for the UK but based on our smaller population this would be roughly 24,000 additional infections and 1,260 deaths annually.
The crisis has been caused by antibiotics being so overprescribed over the past 50 years that the bacteria they are meant to treat have gradually evolved to become resistant.
Experts including the Chief Medical Officer Dame Sally Davies have repeatedly warned that patients could soon die from minor scratches and routine operations after contracting a lethal bug which cannot be treated.
Dr Ramanan Laxminarayan, Director of the Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, Washington, USA examined 31 existing studies published between 1968 and 2011.
Researchers have uncovered ‘catastrophic’ evidence that the vital medication is gradually becoming ineffective because it has been so heavily used
These had all looked antibiotic’s effectiveness at preventing infections common types of surgery and chemotherapy for blood cancers.
The findings published in the Lancet Infectious Diseases show that 39 per cent of infections following c-sections or hysterectomies – to remove the womb – were caused by antibiotic resistant bugs.
This rose to 51 per cent for patients who had been fitted with a pacemaker, 50 per cent following a biopsy for prostate cancer and 27 per cent after chemotherapy.
Dr Laxminarayan said: ‘This is the first study to estimate the impact of antibiotic resistance on broader medical care in the United States.
‘A lot of common surgical procedures and cancer chemotherapy will be virtually impossible if antibiotic resistance is not tackled urgently.
‘Not only is there an immediate need for up-to-date information to establish how antibiotic prophylaxis recommendations should be modified in the face of increasing resistance, but we also need new strategies for the prevention and control of antibiotic resistance at national and international levels.’
Dr Des Walsh, Head of Infections and Immunity at the Medical Research Council, a prestigious UK organisation which funds life-saving studies said: ‘If the antibiotics that we rely on to protect us after common surgery like caesareans, joint replacements, chemotherapy and transplant surgery, don’t work, it’s going to have a catastrophic effect on our healthcare system.’
This Summer, the health watchdog NICE issued stern guidance to GPs threatening to refer them to their regulator, the General Medical Council, if they continued to prescribe too many antibiotics.
Officials warned that ‘soft touch’ family doctors were routinely handing out the pills to patients with coughs, colds and in some instances hayfever.