One of the largest health issues beings studied today is the resistance to antibiotics seen within certain infectious organisms. As this resistance results in antibiotic therapy becoming ineffective for healing patients, new ways to cure the infections caused by the resistant organisms have had to be created. One organism that this antibiotic resistance is present in is the bacterium streptococcus, specifically group A streptococcus. These strains are resistant to penicillin and other beta-lactam antibiotics. As the resistance seen in these strains is expected to spread to other strains and possibly become resistant to other antibiotics, the impact of this resistance is being heavily monitored by infectious disease scientists around the world.
As strep throat is one of the most common infections seen within young children, much of the research conducted regarding streptococcus’s resistance to antibiotics has surrounded how this resistance will affect the number of children infected. According to James M. Musser, the chair of the Department of Pathology and Genomic Medicine at Houston Methodist Hospital, “if this germ becomes truly resistant to these antibiotics, it would have a serious impact on millions of children around the world.” As the group A strains of streptococcus bacterium cause 20-30% of sore throats in children and 5%-15% of sore throats in adults, research must done in an attempt to understand and control the spread of antibiotic resistance between bacteria. Some of this vital research is currently being conducted at Duke University. At Duke, biomedical engineers released a study that concluded that at least 25% of antibiotic-resistant bacteria can directly spread their resistance to other bacteria.
While innate antibiotic resistance is already a large issue within microbiology and healthcare, it is worsened by the fact that this resistance can be spread to other bacteria that don’t innately have antibiotic resistance. This transfer of “information” between bacteria occurs through the exchange of plasmid from an antibiotic-resistant bacterium to a non-antibiotic-resistant bacterium in a process known as conjugation. As this process results in widespread antibiotic resistance, most of the studies conducted today regarding an organism’s antibiotic resistance are focusing on what specific variables increase or decrease the process of conjugation. With this objective in mind, scientists hope to find a variable that can decrease the rate of conjugation to a level that makes the spread of antibiotic resistance a lengthier process, giving scientists time to figure out a new way to eliminate the possibility of antibiotic resistance. As more organisms become antibiotic-resistant, and their resistance to these antibiotics increases, it is vital that a solution is found to avoid large scale health crises around the world.
References
Duke University. “One quarter of bacterial pathogens can spread antibiotic resistance directly to peers: Antibiotics do not affect the speed at which pathogens share resistance genes.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 29 January 2020. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200129125554.htm>.
Houston Methodist. “Discovery reveals antibiotic-resistant strep throat may be too close for comfort.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 29 January 2020. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200129131430.ht
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