Rise of the Superbugs

Hey Steemians, in some of my previous post I talked about antibiotic resistant and the problem associated with it. Today I was just going through some of my previous notes and I came across SUPERBUG, so I just thought about writing about Superbug and new antibiotics which are capable against Superbug.

WHAT IS SUPERBUG? 

A superbug can be defined as a microorganism that’s resistant to commonly used antibiotics.

           

Source

  TYPES OF SUPERBUGS

• Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae(CRE) : CRE are Gram-negative bacteria that are resistant to the carbapenem class of antibiotics. CRE are resistant to this group of antibiotics as they produce an enzyme called carbapenemase that disables the drug molecule.

Source

• Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a Gram-positive bacterium that is genetically different from other strains of Staphylococcus aureus.MRSA is strain of S.aureus that has developed, through horizontal gene transfer and natural selection, multiple drug resistance to beta-lactam antibiotics.

        

        Source

• ESBL-producing Enterobacteriaceae  
• Vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus (VRE)

Source

• Multidrug resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Source

• Multidrug resistant Acinetobacter

                       Source

How Superbugs are formed? 

Superbug is those bacteria which develop resistant to a wide array of antibiotics and are able to survive even in their presence. One probable reason for becoming them superbug is the horizontal gene transfer between bacteria making them antibiotic resistant. In a case researchers have found that NDM-1 is an enzyme gene that can be acquired by common bacteria that cause diseases such as pneumonia, or infections of the urinary tract, kidney, bladder or blood. This enzyme gives bacteria resistant to carbapenem, a string antibiotic that can kill a variety of bacteria (1).

Another reason of increase in Superbug is the misuse or overuse of antibiotics. The misuse of antibiotics like having the antibiotics without the doctor’s prescription or using them even in case of infections other than bacterial like flu.

How to combat the scenario of Superbug development

The basic steps that each individual can follow are to avoid taking antibiotics without doctor’s prescription. And to take antibiotics only during bacterial infections and last but not the least to maintain good hygiene so that chance of getting any infection are less.

Other than these researchers are trying hard to fight against superbugs. A group of scientists from the University of Liverpool have found that phage therapy could be used to treat these Superbugs. Phages therapy is use of bacteriophages to treat bacterial infections. They have shown this study in patients suffering from cystic fibrosis in which they face lung infection with multidrug resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa. In their work they have found that phages are capable of killing bacteria in long term lung infection, indicating a potential therapeutic option (2).

Source

Another way to fight against them is to design new antibiotic to kill superbug like MRSA. In a recent study by Lincoln group has made a significant approach to kill these superbugs by producing the synthetically modified antibiotics. If you are a microbiologist, you may have heard of Teixobactin. If not, it’s the recently discovered natural antibiotics which have no detectable resistance. Lincoln team has synthesized the modified version of this antibiotic which harness the same powerful antibiotic effect (3).

I hope you like reading this article. If you do, please upvote, comment and resteem.

Happy Reading :)

Vinamra