Showing posts with label infection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label infection. Show all posts

New Compunds in a Database to Fight Infection

When things get tough people will try anything. Antibiotics are no longer working, so researchers are asking for newly mixed compounds by chemists to be sent along to them. This a new project set up by the University of Queensland.
Superbugs in a petri dish
The belief is that scientists are working on the same middle of the road compounds. It is in new compounds where hope lies. Every day new compounds are made and just discarded. They are never screened to see what they can do against pathogens.

Community for Open Antimicrobial Drug Discovery (CO-ADD researchers located at UQ are ready to test the compounds against fungi and bacteria, especially superbugs. This will work because rights remain with the chemists who provide the samples.

Funding has been been gained from sources in Australia, New Zealand, the U.S., France and India. The project began in February and will be ongoing. Prevalent diseases like malaria an dengue fever will be included in the target list. The database will be open to the public.
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Dangerous Love - Gonorrhoea

Millions of dollars is being spent in HIV research.  It is mainly spread by sexual contact. However, venereal diseases in general are being forgotten.

Antibiotics are becoming ineffective in combating venereal diseases. Such infections have been around for thousands of years and there is still no cure. Antibiotics used to "knock it on the head" in the past. This luxury no longer exists.

A serious resistant strain of gonorrhoea is extant in Australia and New Zealand. It has now arrived on our doorstep. A8806 is very similar to H041 which is absolutely untreatable. Different resistant strains have appeared in Japan, the US and Norway.

Because people today are more promiscuous than ever "the clap" is spreading extremely fast. The disease affects the whole body invading mucous membranes such as the sexual organs, eyes and throat. Arthritis, heart infections and meningitis can result.

Most people have serious symptoms. Pain when urinating, bleeding and oozing puss are common. The greatest problem is that some sufferers have no symptoms at all, so they unknowingly keep spreading the disease.
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HIV Reaching Record Levels in Australia

It seems Mankind hasn't moved far away from its ancient existence - living in a literal "bath" of disease.  All other living things live in hostile environments, if not from predators then from a plethora of diseases.

Antibiotics are losing their efficacy.  They no longer work.  There are only a few that are effective against hospital acquired infections (HAI).  Furthermore, it will be a shock to many that there is still no real treatment for fungal infections.  Once you suffer from fungal problems you have to keep on applying various ointments.

Australia has reached a dangerous point in regard to HIV.  Last year new HIV infections rose to their highest point in 20 years.  Because younger people are experimenting with sex, this is the group contracting the disease at the highest level.  Infections have been increasing since 1999.  It is now at a rate of 24 per cent a year, from 10 per cent in 1999.

Despite attempts to destigmatize the way HIV is contracted, the reality is that 60 per cent of new infections are between consenting males.  Perhaps there is a strong case for allowing marriage between same sex couples.  This would reduce philandering to a significant degree.  Otherwise, we could see some countries introducing a register of those with the disease and major penalties for intentionally infecting others.
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Western Adults Have Chronic Raised Immune Responses

People who live in industrialized countries are physically weak when they are attacked by parasites, microbes and viruses. This is because children are increasingly being brought up in clean, sterile environments. If they are not exposed to these dangers as children they could die if "bugs" invade their bodies when they become adults.

In Ecuador, the Shuar people have a high childhood death rate, three times that in Western countries. However, as adults their immune systems are stronger. A group of Shuar adults was tested for inflammatory levels. Some had very low levels. Others had moderately high levels, below the chronic level, probably because they were in the process of becoming ill or had been sick.

Western adults have a generally high level of inflammation, constantly. There bodies fight "minor" infections all the time. Consequently, damage is caused to the body resulting in diabetes, cancer, heart attack and stroke. A Chronic level of inflammation can be a killer.

As susceptible Shuar children die, adults develop the "correct" immune response, only fighting back strongly against dangerous infections. Western adults' immune systems are not "tuned", as childhood minor infections are prevented. Basically, this is why people in developing countries may die in an epidemic, but they can survive an infective environment better than first world adults. Third world adults carry infections and have a mild immune response, when Western people would probably not survive living in such muddy conditions, particularly with the dirty water.
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Fungal Infections Kill Many People

Fungal infection is the most difficult thing to treat.  Taking medication and applying ointment may seem to solve the problem - for a while.  Unfortunately, the skin may appear to be free of infection but it is still there and will reappear.

It is not commonly known that deaths from fungal infection are higher than all the deaths from malaria and tuberculosis.  Treatment for other ailments can involve immunossuppressive medication.  This allows fungal infections to run wild. 

You would think there is enough demand and money for pharmaceutical companies to develop better anti-fungal drugs.  However, sufferers do not know how deadly the "disease" can be, so they are not prepared to pay a high price for new treatments.  This is despite the fact that fungal infection can appear in any part of the body.

Unfortunately, the World Health Organization shows little interest in the problem.  Doctors also tend to brush aside fungal infections when examining patients.  If asked, doctors say it is common and people live with it without treatment.  This is a great mistake.  It should be treated when first seen in order to stop it becoming well established, because long term fungal infection is difficult to treat.
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Pharmaceutical Medicines in Short Supply

People are taking more prescription drugs. Western countries including Australia make them easy to obtain because they are heavily subsidized. As developing countries move forward they too are inclined to make medications available to everyone. We take it for granted that all medicines will be "out there" ready to buy.

Last year in the US 196 common drugs were in short supply. Less than 100 ran short in 2006. Most of the medications were for anaesthetic, cancer or anti-infection use. Recently, shortages became apparent in Australia. Use of alternative drugs is not ideal. Side effects and less effective treatment occur.

It seems pharmaceutical manufacturers are only interested in producing products with safe patents that have high profit margins. When patents expire and governments want cheap generic drugs they are becoming harder to obtain. Governments are economically inelastic when it comes to what they will pay. They offer drug companies a fixed amount - take it or leave it. If there is no profit margin, in the future there will be no drugs.
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