Originally published July 22 2004
Physicians warn of looming superbug crisis
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
There's a superbug crisis brewing in the United States, and it's caused by the overprescription of antibiotics by doctors. The answer to this crisis, say medical researchers, is to come up with yet more antibiotics. If we don't, hundreds of thousands of hospitalized patients could die each year from superbug infections that simply can't be treated with even the strongest antibiotics available today. I have a different take on all this: maybe antibiotics are the problem, not the solution. Maybe we need to support patients' immune systems so they can fight off infections, and stop concocting ever more complicated pharmaceuticals that actually promote the breeding of drug-resistant strains of bacteria.
-
To avert a looming public health crisis with a unique set of underlying causes, Congress and the Administration, including federal public health agencies, must act quickly to reinvigorate pharmaceutical investment in antibiotic research and development (R&D).
- Otherwise, doctors won't have drugs to protect Americans against antibiotic-resistant infections---a rapidly growing and often deadly problem already causing alarm among public health officials.
- A Public Health Crisis Brews, which the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) presents today to Congress and federal policymakers.
- The report is the product of a year's worth of research by some of the country's top infectious disease physicians.
- "With the threat of bioterrorism, the growing number of microorganisms resistant to drug therapy, the reemergence of previously deadly infectious diseases, and the emergence of new infectious diseases in the United States, there is an urgent need for new antimicrobials," Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) stated.
- It is vital that antibiotics research and development is reinvigorated so doctors have the medicines they need to protect the health of millions of Americans."
- This year, nearly 2 million people in the United States will acquire bacterial infections while in the hospital, and about 90,000 of them will die, according to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
- More than 70 percent of the bacteria that cause these infections will be resistant to at least one of the drugs commonly used to fight them.
- "The Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act, the Orphan Drug Act, and Project Bioshield, which President Bush is signing today, are three examples.
All content posted on this site is commentary or opinion and is protected under Free Speech. Truth Publishing LLC takes sole responsibility for all content. Truth Publishing sells no hard products and earns no money from the recommendation of products. NaturalNews.com is presented for educational and commentary purposes only and should not be construed as professional advice from any licensed practitioner. Truth Publishing assumes no responsibility for the use or misuse of this material. For the full terms of usage of this material, visit www.NaturalNews.com/terms.shtml