I went abroad and studied antimicrobial resistance briefly, while doing a master in cellular biology. I did hands-on virulence research in safety labs, and a lot of theory.
Bacteria are simple. That’s why we have already exhausted all major pathways for drug mechanisms.
At that time, multiresistant bacteria were already everywhere. Resistant pathogens were found deep in the Amazon, and in Antarctica
Resistance will only increase. It will be bad. Could be real bad. Back to times hospital care can’t cure anything, only nudge your odds. And surgery might get tricky.
My dad’s grandpa coughed himself to death, at home, resting alone in a shed next to the house. This due to a bug that today is cured within days, without hospital care. Our children may suffer the same fate.
What did we learn? We have almost all of human history to look back at, but we don’t care.
But we are at least slowing down the overuse right? Not really. Overuse is rampant. Many countries, even western ones (US *cough*), happily throw drugs into healthy animals on an industrial scale.
In parts of LATAM, even the synthetic HC stuff is as readily available as painkillers. No need to think of doctor. No need for doctor to think.
But we are increasing research budgets right? Nah.
But some states are planning ahead? Sadly, no. We can’t do much until the overuse stops. Some countries have cynically said they will wait until many more people start dying, before they take any action. Too much effort.
And like nuclear waste, it will take a loong time to reduce the resistant strains. Given that we actually try.
That’s why we have already exhausted all major pathways for drug mechanisms.
That’s not true there’s research like Zampaloni et al 2024 that proposes new antibiotic classes.
What did we learn? We have almost all of human history to look back at, but we don’t care.
We do care. We care so much that we essentially made the development of new antibiotics commercially unviable. Companies that managed to bring new antibiotics to market like Achaogen, Tetraphase, Nabriva Therapeutics and Melinta Therapeutics all failed commercially.
We do fund the research of people like Zampaloni but we make rules that prevent companies for selling newly developed antibiotics to people who want to buy them and therefore BioTech companies and Big Pharma has little incentive to translate research findings such as that of Zampaloni et al into a commercial products. They don’t want to suffer the same fate as Achaogen, Tetraphase, Nabriva Therapeutics and Melinta Therapeutics.
This is similar to COVID-19 an example where experts do care a lot about the problem but then make bad policy. The reason “I’m a researcher, I know about a problem, so the solution should be more research on the problem”, even if it would take something else.
I am familiar with this research, as well as how the US big pharma operates.
All that aside,
The core issue globally IS overuse.
And it IS true that we have made bacteria resistant to major pathways. Now we are exploiting new ones but the effectiveness and RoI is declining.
New drugs won’t save us. They won’t even hold the line forever. The best new drugs would be kept in reserve by doctors for the most serious resistant strains, which is why there is low commercial interest. The resistance drives this dynamic.
Another contemporary example: ANTIBIOTICS.
I went abroad and studied antimicrobial resistance briefly, while doing a master in cellular biology. I did hands-on virulence research in safety labs, and a lot of theory.
Bacteria are simple. That’s why we have already exhausted all major pathways for drug mechanisms.
At that time, multiresistant bacteria were already everywhere. Resistant pathogens were found deep in the Amazon, and in Antarctica
Resistance will only increase. It will be bad. Could be real bad. Back to times hospital care can’t cure anything, only nudge your odds. And surgery might get tricky.
My dad’s grandpa coughed himself to death, at home, resting alone in a shed next to the house. This due to a bug that today is cured within days, without hospital care. Our children may suffer the same fate.
What did we learn? We have almost all of human history to look back at, but we don’t care.
But we are at least slowing down the overuse right? Not really. Overuse is rampant. Many countries, even western ones (US *cough*), happily throw drugs into healthy animals on an industrial scale.
In parts of LATAM, even the synthetic HC stuff is as readily available as painkillers. No need to think of doctor. No need for doctor to think.
But we are increasing research budgets right? Nah.
But some states are planning ahead? Sadly, no. We can’t do much until the overuse stops. Some countries have cynically said they will wait until many more people start dying, before they take any action. Too much effort.
And like nuclear waste, it will take a loong time to reduce the resistant strains. Given that we actually try.
That’s not true there’s research like Zampaloni et al 2024 that proposes new antibiotic classes.
We do care. We care so much that we essentially made the development of new antibiotics commercially unviable. Companies that managed to bring new antibiotics to market like Achaogen, Tetraphase, Nabriva Therapeutics and Melinta Therapeutics all failed commercially.
We do fund the research of people like Zampaloni but we make rules that prevent companies for selling newly developed antibiotics to people who want to buy them and therefore BioTech companies and Big Pharma has little incentive to translate research findings such as that of Zampaloni et al into a commercial products. They don’t want to suffer the same fate as Achaogen, Tetraphase, Nabriva Therapeutics and Melinta Therapeutics.
This is similar to COVID-19 an example where experts do care a lot about the problem but then make bad policy. The reason “I’m a researcher, I know about a problem, so the solution should be more research on the problem”, even if it would take something else.
I am familiar with this research, as well as how the US big pharma operates.
All that aside,
The core issue globally IS overuse.
And it IS true that we have made bacteria resistant to major pathways. Now we are exploiting new ones but the effectiveness and RoI is declining.
New drugs won’t save us. They won’t even hold the line forever. The best new drugs would be kept in reserve by doctors for the most serious resistant strains, which is why there is low commercial interest. The resistance drives this dynamic.