Corner stone seminar 3: Resisting resistance Flashcards
How can we reduce bacterial infection without antibiotics?
Reducing transmission through sanitation and vaccination
What limited access to antibiotics around the world?
health inequalities
In rich countries what are most infectious diseases?
healthcare infections
What healthcare things come with infection risk?
- transplants
- complex operations
- Orthopaedic implants
- chemotherapy
- broad spectrum treatments
- catheters
- things that dampen the immune system like aging and premature babies
Where do most infectious diseases come from?
bacteria that are already on/in the body waiting to get in a sterile site or for a comprised immune system
Why don’t we know the true burden of antibiotic resistance?
Most countries don’t have it as a priority as they have bigger problems so it is hard to quantify the problem
What are the 2 main mechanisms of antibiotic resistance?
- reduced permeability and efflux
- enzymatic degradation of the antibiotic
How does antibiotic resistance transmit through bacterial populations?
- Many of the enzymes are pre-evolved so they are on mobile genetic elements
- Bacteria are very old and have encountered most antibiotics before so have had the time to develop resistance
- Pass the resistance through the populations on mobile genetic elements
How is antibiotic-resistant bacteria transmitted between people?
- mostly as commensals until immunocompromised
- families share bacteria between themselves and their dogs
- dogs encounter many bacteria in the environment and bring them into contact with people
Why did development of antibiotics stall in the 80s?
- the original ones were too successful and there was no real need for more for a few years
- people stopped researching as it looked like it wasn’t needed
- this created a vacuum of research when resistance was rising and a lot of expertise was separated or gone
What was the BristolBridge project?
- throw money at people and try to find something that works
- an interdisciplinary international research
- funding research and one health studies in other countries like Thailand
How is Antibiotic susceptibility testing currently done?
- phenotypic testing
- limited by growth rates
How did an interdisciplinary approach lead to the development of new AST that is now on clinical trials?
- An observation that bacteria could vibrate like particles and that we could use it to detect if the bacteria were still alive
- Use physicists to use light waves to detect this vibration
- resistant bacteria would live and keep moving
- we would know within minutes if the bacteria was resistant
- use engineers to make this machine
What are One Health studies?
A research approach the recognises the human health is closely linked to animal health and the environment
Why is raw feeding dogs bad for antibiotic resistance?
they pick up more resistant bacteria and pass them onto the people they live with
