Antibiotic Resistance: A Medical Crisis
What you must know about antibiotic resistance
Antibiotic resistance occurs when bacteria develop resistance towards the medicines that are designed to destroy them. The bacteria will not respond to medicine and continue to grow, leading to severe complications and even death. This has led to serious implications, especially in people with chronic illnesses as we become unable to treat infections and affect global health. In this article, let’s see what is antibiotic resistance, how it occurred in the first place, its impact and what steps can be taken to prevent and control its impact.
Antibiotics
Bacteria are single-cell organisms that can be found everywhere. Your body houses trillions of bacteria and they help the body carry out essential functions. If you have come across my previous article Metagenomics — Who is there and what are they doing? you may know that these bacteria play an important role in our metabolism and immune system.
However, some bacteria can harm your body and even kill you. Many people have died from bacterial infections until the first commercialized antibiotic penicillin was discovered in 1928 by Alexander Fleming. The discovery of antibiotics revolutionised medicine and saved many lives which might have been lost due to bacterial…
