The greatest threat to humanity isn't terrorism, it's superbugs

WHILE the greatest concern of the world these days is the spread of terrorism, an even greater threat to humanity is invisible.

So-called superbugs are threatening to unleash a global epidemics of untreatable infections, after breaching the last line of antibiotic defences.

Chinese researchers say they have identified a gene that enables infectious bacteria, such as E.coli, to become untreatable.

Up to now, the class of drugs known as Polymyxins were the only antibiotics that worked when all others had failed.

The reason that antibiotics are losing their ability to treat illnesses is because they have been so overused, enabling bacteria to become resistant.

The World Health Organisation — rarely given to hyperbole — says that the rise of antibiotic resistance is a global health crisis.

Medical experts in Ireland predict that the development of alternative antibiotics is at least five to seven years away.

The danger is that antibiotic resistance could send medicine back decades, with even the smallest infections proving lethal.

GPs and vets have a role to play in ensuring this does not happen, by showing restraint in prescribing antibiotics as the first drugs of choice.