If it sometimes seems like the idea of antibiotic resistance, though unsettling, is more theoretical than real, please read on.
Public health officials from Nevada are reporting on a case of a woman who died in Reno in September from an incurable infection. Testing showed the superbug that had spread throughout her system could fend off 26 different antibiotics.
"It was tested against everything that's available in the United States ... and was not effective," said Dr. Alexander Kallen, a medical officer in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's division of health care quality promotion. Although this isn't the first time someone in the US has been infected with pan-resistant bacteria, at this point, it is not common. It is, however, alarming.
[Journal Ref.]: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/66/wr/mm6601a7.htm
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday January 16 2017, @12:42AM
This had occurred to me, but, not being an expert in virology, it's giving me T-virus flashbacks. Seriously, how do you stop your phage cohort from mutating into something potentially even worse? Even sticking in some sort of terminator gene isn't a guarantee, since it could mutate or otherwise excise that gene out...or, worse, pass it into YOUR DNA if it's a retrovirus.
Sometimes I think that what will do the human race in is a biotech experiment gone wrong.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...