A new antibiotic appears to deliver long-hoped-for support in killing or reducing dangerous antibiotic-resistant germs, while at the same time sparing helpful microbes living within the gut.
Antibiotic resistance, or antimicrobial resistance (AR) is a pressing medical concern. Antibiotics were once touted as miracle drugs, sparing the limbs and lives of patients who would otherwise have died. The first classes of antibiotics were developed and widely used between 1940 and the 1960’s. As antibiotic use went mainstream, the drugs were over-prescribed. Over-use coupled with the unique abilities of common germs to develop resistance to drugs designed to kill them led to the pitched battle we see today—strains of infections that lead to sepsis and pneumonia which cannot be outrun with existing drugs.
Sepsis is an amplified response by the human immune system to infection. The immune system mistakenly attacks itself. If medical care is not sought, or if healthcare providers do not recognize the septic response, death or disability can quickly occur.
Recently, researchers from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign explored the protein transport system of a class of drugs developed by pharmaceutical company, AstraZeneca. Although founded in 1999, AstraZeneca became a household name as one of the Pharma manufacturers working on the COVID-19 vaccine initiative.
In a mouse study published in Nature, study authors identified one of the drugs developed by AstraZeneca, lolamicin, as effective in targeting acute pneumonia, Escherichia coli (E. coli), Enterobacter cloacae, and secondary infections caused by Clostridoides difficile (C. diff). Because the microbiome of mice is effective for modeling human infections, the research team found that lolamicin did not cause severe changes in the microbiome, unlike standard treatment antibiotics like clindamycin and amoxicillin which diminish the number and diversity of beneficial microbes when used to ward off infection.
Noted study lead Dr. Paul Hergenrother, “People are starting to realize that the antibiotics we’ve all been taking — that are fighting infection and, in some instances, saving our lives — also are having these deleterious effects on us. They’re killing our good bacteria as they treat the infection. We wanted to start thinking about the next generation of antibiotics that could be developed to kill the pathogenic bacteria and not the beneficial ones.”
This is an early mouse study that will require additional research to determine the effectiveness of this new class of antibiotics for humans. That said, it is welcome news for patients who need effective treatment for infections from increasingly resistant germs.
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