When We Lose Antibiotics, Here’s Everything Else We’ll Lose Too

[Avalux]

14. There are scientists and clinicians in academia who need funding to do the work and can't get it.

Developing new drugs takes a lot of time and money - when done, most of them fall out in early stages of development. There is no quick fix to this, even if an initiative is started now it would take decades.

A couple of my pet peeves....

Internal medicine physicians prescribing broad spectrum (big gun) antibiotics for infections where a targeted antibiotic would be effective. We need to protect the powerful ones and only use them for really bad bugs, but that isn't happening. There is a finesse to prescribing antibiotics that is often neglected.

Viral vs. Bacterial. Often a hysterical mother will take her sick child to the doctor and instead of being told she has to wait it out because the infection is viral, it's easier for a physician to prescribe an antibiotic (that won't help in any way) just to make the mother feel better. It happens all the time.