Exciting New Finding in Antibiotic Treatment
This report from the BBC indicates that there is a method to boost the
succeptibility of an extremrly dangerous bacterium to treatment with
standard antibiotics. Given the risk posed by the problem of
resistnace, this is great news.
The really exciting thing about this is that it represents a new approach to the problem of antibiotic resistance.
Hospital
superbug treatment hope
A way of making the hospital 'superbug' MRSA
vulnerable to the
antibiotics it normally resists has been discovered, UK researchers
say.
Methicillin works in the same way as penicillin, by blocking bacterial enzymes called PBPs, which normally strengthen cell walls.
The first strains of Staphylococcus aureus that were resistant to the drug appeared in 1961, just two years after it was first used.
It became resistant by picking up the gene for another PBP enzyme, PBP2a, which methicillin is unable to bind to. [...]
But the concentrations of the glycine compounds had to be extremely high to have this effect.
However, more recent tests by the researchers found a particular glycine compound, BT19976a, makes MRSA susceptible to antibiotics using concentrations regarded as safe.
Many of the antibiotics available to doctors cannot be used against MRSA because the doses needed would be toxic. [...]
 The researchers claim the treatment would remove
the bug's 'super' status |
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus is so-called Because it is immune to the antibiotic methicillin.
But scientists at Worcestershire firm Pharmaceutica formulate that resistance coud be neutralised completed an amino acid callinged glycine.
Their rein is published separating New Scientist treatise. [...]
Some strains of the bacterium are also resistant to other antibiotics, including vancomycin, the "last resort" treatment for MRSA.Methicillin works in the same way as penicillin, by blocking bacterial enzymes called PBPs, which normally strengthen cell walls.
The first strains of Staphylococcus aureus that were resistant to the drug appeared in 1961, just two years after it was first used.
It became resistant by picking up the gene for another PBP enzyme, PBP2a, which methicillin is unable to bind to. [...]
But the concentrations of the glycine compounds had to be extremely high to have this effect.
However, more recent tests by the researchers found a particular glycine compound, BT19976a, makes MRSA susceptible to antibiotics using concentrations regarded as safe.
Many of the antibiotics available to doctors cannot be used against MRSA because the doses needed would be toxic. [...]
The really exciting thing about this is that it represents a new approach to the problem of antibiotic resistance.