Rampant Staph Outbreaks

[Zen]

Consider yourself lucky, Queen. In Maryland and Virginia it's shut down schools and caused deaths.

Bacteria multiply and evolve rapidly, like every twenty minutes. Look at these search results

[northstar]

I heard about this today on public radio. Apparently they've had success containing it in NC by doing pretty much all-out isolation once someone's discovered to have it.

Scary!

[smilingcat]

The superbug is tthe result of indiscriminate use of drugs from poultry farms, to big agri-business where they are using it in the feed for cattle for pig, even for fish/shrimp farms.

You should expect the bugs to develop immunity to the anti-biotic "toxins".

The interesting thing is that I think it was in Sweden where they have banned anti-biotic use in the feed and can now only be used if the animal is sick. Wtihin three years of the ban, the superbug disappeared.

The reason for the loss of immunity has to deal with a rather simple concept: an organism has only finite resources, if it develops a immunity to a new threat, it is generally at a loss of some other traits. When anti-biotic was removed from their environment, the immunity no longer served them as a useful trait. And it becomes a burden rather than an asset, thus more pressing or needed traits are expressed while the immunity to the anti-biotic traits are turned off or lost.

We should only use anti-biotics only when we really need it. not for a simple cold or flue... The abuse of anti-biotic is another source of major concerns of the environment.

This is worrysome though...since I'm alergic to Cipro.
Smilingcat

[Pax]

The superbug is tthe result of indiscriminate use of drugs from poultry farms, to big agri-business where they are using it in the feed for cattle for pig, even for fish/shrimp farms.

You should expect the bugs to develop immunity to the anti-biotic "toxins".

The interesting thing is that I think it was in Sweden where they have banned anti-biotic use in the feed and can now only be used if the animal is sick. Wtihin three years of the ban, the superbug disappeared.

The reason for the loss of immunity has to deal with a rather simple concept: an organism has only finite resources, if it develops a immunity to a new threat, it is generally at a loss of some other traits. When anti-biotic was removed from their environment, the immunity no longer served them as a useful trait. And it becomes a burden rather than an asset, thus more pressing or needed traits are expressed while the immunity to the anti-biotic traits are turned off or lost.

We should only use anti-biotics only when we really need it. not for a simple cold or flue... The abuse of anti-biotic is another source of major concerns of the environment.

This is worrysome though...since I'm alergic to Cipro.
Smilingcat

I find that info about Sweden very interesting, my doc was extremely concerned about the drug resistant staph infection I got from the spider bite. She said they had no drug that would work against it and was worried it would only get worse. It healed up within two weeks...I've eaten a primarily plant based diet for the last year and a half (no meat, eggs, dairy), I wonder if that helped me heal up??

[Zen]

Probly so, Queen. That and chocolate
I don't even buy antibiotic dish soap.

[alpinerabbit]

Oh yeah please don't do the antibiotic detergent route.

[/on soapbox]Antibiotic resistant staph was my Ph.D. topic......

there's new antibiotics coming, a swiss company will get approval shortly for a new anti-staph drug but the most important things to do is to not use them for trivial infections, not ask for them against viral infections, use your course to the end if you get them, and ban them for livestock growth promotion....
[/off soapbox]

[velogirl]

My father died of MRSA -- 10 years ago on Monday. It was a six month, near-death, miraculous recovery, near-death cycle, until he finally succumbed.

I miss him.