preview

Antibiotics: The Controversy Of Antibiotic Resistance

Better Essays

Introduction Antibiotics are amongst the most important medical discoveries and their introduction represents a remarkable success story (Hedin, 2011). The term antibiotics literally means against life (Walsh, 2000). Thus antibiotics can be used against any microbe such as bacteria, viruses, fungi, and protozoa. However, some people use the term to only apply to bacteria, but in this paper, the more appropriate term will be used.
Widespread use of antibiotics has been very controversial in the media as well in the general population. Due to these controversies, it is very misunderstood to how antibiotics work leading to many patients in the hospital setting wanting to take them when it is not necessary or refusing to take when it is necessary for their survival. Some of this controversy is due to antibiotic resistance, which has spread an alarming rate in the 21st century (Walsh, 2000). Antibiotic resistance is the result of very strong bacteria or microbes that are resistant to the antibiotic prescribed and those microbes accumulate overtime by their survival, reproduction and transfer, leading to increased levels of antibiotic resistance.
I have chosen this topic due to the controversies of using antibiotics due to antibiotic resistance. …show more content…

There is a huge need for antibacterial drugs as infectious diseases are the second leading cause of death worldwide and the third leading cause of death in developed countries (Projan, 2003). Over the past 60-70 years, most antibiotics have been discovered by screening of soil samples for natural products that kill bacteria, including known pathogens, first on culture plates and then in animal infections (Walsh, 2000). There are three proven targets for the main antibacterial drugs, bacterial cell all biosynthesis, bacterial protein synthesis, and bacterial DNA replication and

Get Access