Person with bacteria resistant to "last resort" antibiotics found in US

[Independent voter]

What happens if this woman gets an infection? Does she die?

More at link

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...ached-the-u-s/

For the first time, researchers have found a person in the United States carrying bacteria resistant to antibiotics of last resort, an alarming development that the top U.S. public health official says could signal "the end of the road" for antibiotics.

The antibiotic-resistant strain was found last month in the urine of a 49-year-old Pennsylvania woman. Defense Department researchers determined that she carried a strain of E. coli resistant to the antibiotic colistin, according to a study published Thursday in Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, a publication of the American Society for Microbiology. The authors wrote that the discovery "heralds the emergence of a truly pan-drug resistant bacteria."


Colistin is the antibiotic of last resort for particularly dangerous types of superbugs, including a family of bacteria known as CRE, which health officials have dubbed "nightmare bacteria." In some instances, these superbugs kill up to 50 percent of patients who become infected. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has called CRE among the country's most urgent public health threats.

Health officials said the case in Pennsylvania, by itself, is not cause for panic. The strain found in the woman is treatable with some other antibiotics. But researchers worry that the antibiotic-resistant gene found in the bacteria, known as mcr-1, could spread to other types of bacteria that can already evade other types of antibiotics.

It's the first time this colistin-resistant strain has been found in a person in the United States. In November, public health officials worldwide reacted with alarm when Chinese and British researchers reported finding the colistin-resistant strain in pigs, raw pork meat and in a small number of people in China. The deadly strain was later discovered in Europe, Africa, South America and Canada.

“It basically shows us that the end of the road isn’t very far away for antibiotics — that we may be in a situation where we have patients in our intensive-care units, or patients getting urinary tract infections for which we do not have antibiotics,” CDC Director Tom Frieden said in an interview Thursday.

The colistin-resistant E. coli found in the Pennsylvania woman has this type of resistance gene.

Public health officials say they have expecting this resistance gene to turn up in the United States.

"This is definitely alarming," said David Hyun, a senior officer leading an antibiotic-resistance project at the Pew Charitable Trust. "The fact that we found it in the United States confirms our suspicions and adds urgency to actions we need to work on antibiotic stewardship and surveillance for this type of resistance."

[Reeve]

Bacteria develop resistances to new antibiotics typically after only 2 years or so on the market. Drug companies are losing interest in developing new antibiotics because the time to resistance is shorter than the time to recoup the investment. Or so a podcast I listened to last year said.

[Sierra85]

Bacteria develop resistances to new antibiotics typically after only 2 years or so on the market. Drug companies are losing interest in developing new antibiotics because the time to resistance is shorter than the time to recoup the investment.

The drug companies should have a duty of care to society to continue to develop these drugs so we don't all die.

I expect governments will have to step in to ensure they do so.

[Deleted]

Most dramatic headlines like this are just crying wolf. This on the other hand is a VERY real threat.

Only 1 new antibiotic has been discovered in the past 30 years and scientists are struggling to find more.

We appear fucked.

[Tijuana]

Most dramatic headlines like this are just crying wolf. This on the other hand is a VERY real threat.

Only 1 new antibiotic has been discovered in the past 30 years and scientists are struggling to find more.

We appear fucked.

If only there was some way for creatures to evolve...

[Masark]

We seriously need to push money to antibiotic research.

And also towards bacteriophage research.

And by "seriously", I mean something along the lines of "add a zero to the NIH's and CDC's budgets".

[Teebone]

If only there was some way for creatures to evolve...

Nature I think hit our "B" button.

[Dezerte]

If only there was some way for creatures to evolve...

Yeah, I think using engineered bacteria to fight super-bacteria may be a possible venue in the future.

[Dellis0991]

The possible scenarios are scary when you think about that type of bacteria turning other more common bacterias into resistant ones. It will be like the black death all over again.

[Masark]

Yeah, I think using engineered bacteria to fight super-bacteria may be a possible venue in the future.

Or viruses. See bacteriophage.

[araine]

Bacteria develop resistances to new antibiotics typically after only 2 years or so on the market. Drug companies are losing interest in developing new antibiotics because the time to resistance is shorter than the time to recoup the investment. Or so a podcast I listened to last year said.

which proves for profit medicine doesnt get the job done. since they will make more $$$ developing a drug to make the limp dicks of 79 yr old white males hard again. And ask yourself is that really a good use of resources for humanity

[Dezerte]

Or viruses. See bacteriophage.

Ah yeah, I read this http://www.nature.com/news/antibioti...s-race-1.17621

[Deleted]

We seriously need to push money to antibiotic research.

And also towards bacteriophage research.

And by "seriously", I mean something along the lines of "add a zero to the NIH's and CDC's budgets".

They are allready working on bacteriophage studies that can be used to target specific bacteria

[Drynix]

Being a person who works in the lab daily and with a boatload of anti-biotics, this is far from the end of the road for them. The bacterial genome isn't large enough to host a gene making them resistant all present antibiotics. And even with plasmids and things like that, the bacterial cell would become far to unstable to work in that manner.

It might be a scary thought to not have a last resort all killer and treatment could get more expansive as different types of antibiotics are needed to cure disease, but their effectiveness will not dissappear.

And to those people claiming things like only a few new antibiotics have been developed over the recent years, thats mostly because of 2 reasons. We have stricter regulations on what is allowed and what isn't (by the new rules, something like penicilin would NEVER have passed any of the standards we use today). And the pharmacutical industry actually holding back the development on purpose. Both to prevent these so called "super bacteria" and to increase profit. Call it inhuman, but a business is a business and they have to play it smart to earn money and fund other research.

There have actually been some new antibiotics / antimicrobia, but these are so extremly effective that they do not push them for phase 1-3 testing on humans just yet to have back-up future last resort antibiotics. And ofcourse the few that are so extremly potent that they injure the person being treated aswel, because there simply is nothing that could ever be immune to it (Due to the target being both broad on a vital system in all cells, but also so specific that if any form of mutation happens, the system on its own just stop working and an " immune " version could never exist).

Its a misintrepetation from the media on how these things works, as per usual with most sciency stuff. Nothing to be scared of here really.

[Deleted]

Or maybe take all of your antibiotics and don't stop when you think you're better? Maybe don't hand out antibiotics for everyone who walks in with a sore throat.

im guilty of this, when i was a teen i was given anti biotics for an infection, the doc never told me i wasn't supposed to stop taking them, so as soon as the infection cleared up i just stopped taking them. at the time i didn't realise it was a bad thing to do, doctors should make sure this information is actually known by the patient when they prescribe it.

[Reeve]

which proves for profit medicine doesnt get the job done. since they will make more $$$ developing a drug to make the limp dicks of 79 yr old white males hard again. And ask yourself is that really a good use of resources for humanity

Hey, solid dick pills generate a lot of marginal utility! I'm sure it makes a lot of people VERY happy!

[Deleted]

If people never learn to take their full course of antibiotics then this will continue even if we discover more.

Also doctors that prescribe antibiotics for non-bacterial health issues aren't helping.

[Tijuana]

I mean maybe the planet just wipes a shit load of us out every once in a while and we just need to learn to deal with that fact internally.

[AwkwardSquirtle]

which proves for profit medicine doesnt get the job done. since they will make more $$$ developing a drug to make the limp dicks of 79 yr old white males hard again. And ask yourself is that really a good use of resources for humanity

Viagra was a accident, supposed to deal with something to do with blood pressure iirc. People in the trial reported that it was making them hard, and it wasn't doing what it was supposed to do, so they sold it as Viagra.

[demonicpanda]

The drug companies should have a duty of care to society to continue to develop these drugs so we don't all die.

I expect governments will have to step in to ensure they do so.

Drug companies have a duty to care only for their shareholders. That's as it should be in a market economy.

However, this is most definitely a place where government funded science is glaringly needed. Government science is specifically intended to throw money at things that aren't immediately profitable, but are nevertheless beneficial to society as a whole.