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Photos: Disease vs. drugs: How microbes are winning the war
Experts warn that a global health crisis is on the horizon as drugs available for once treatable diseases are losing their edge. The bacteria, viruses and parasites behind diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria and gonorrhea are fighting back by developing resistance to our arsenal of pharmaceuticals.
With the World Health Organization saying that we could be heading to a "post-antibiotic age," what infections are becoming a concern?
Report by Meera Senthilingam
With the World Health Organization saying that we could be heading to a "post-antibiotic age," what infections are becoming a concern?
Report by Meera Senthilingam
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Photos: Disease vs. drugs: How microbes are winning the war
Malaria (insert: Plasmodium falciparum)
Malaria was a target for global eradication in 1955 using the once potent drug chloroquine as the weapon of choice to kill the plasmodium parasites behind the disease. However, resistance to the drug developed and spread rapidly across the world rendering the drug, and hope of eradication, useless by the 1970s.
A new wave of excitement came soon after with the arrival of artemisinin, which is today prescribed as a combination therapy to avoid the development of resistance. Despite this strategy, resistance has been reported in Cambodia and could once again spread globally. Globalization and increasing travel to remote locations means the 200 million cases of malaria estimated to occur each year are not just a concern for developing countries.
Malaria was a target for global eradication in 1955 using the once potent drug chloroquine as the weapon of choice to kill the plasmodium parasites behind the disease. However, resistance to the drug developed and spread rapidly across the world rendering the drug, and hope of eradication, useless by the 1970s.
A new wave of excitement came soon after with the arrival of artemisinin, which is today prescribed as a combination therapy to avoid the development of resistance. Despite this strategy, resistance has been reported in Cambodia and could once again spread globally. Globalization and increasing travel to remote locations means the 200 million cases of malaria estimated to occur each year are not just a concern for developing countries.
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