Posted 4/6/2019 10:27 AM (GMT -5)
Yep, a never ending cycle. Ever since the miracle drug Penicillin(PCN), we have been killing all of the bugs except a few that the PCN couldn't kill. Then, these bugs were left alive, and once they reproduced and rose up enough to cause trouble, we managed to come up with another drug that would kill most of them. But still not all, at least not in all cases. And the cycle keeps repeating over the decades until all that is left are the bugs which are resistant to whatever we currently have.
To make matter worse, we have abused the drugs. So, we go to the docs with a virus, and demand antibiotics(AB) which have no effect on the virus. And the doc gives them to us to keep us from going to another doc until we get what we want. (or, we are given prophylactic ABs for surgery or dental work, or they are in our food) Then the antibiotic does nothing to the virus. But whatever bad(and some good!) bacteria might be lurking in our system- held under control by our immune systems along with competition from other bugs, good or bad- are killed off. Except, of course, the ones that are living in us that the AB can not kill. Then the bugs that are resistant are left to reproduce without the competition from those other bugs. An ever repeating vicious cycle. It helped us at first, but the ability to do so is rapidly decreasing. The survivors of the previous AB doses are getting to be the only ones left, more so every day. Not good news. Scary, actually.
It reminds me some what of my days giving anesthesia, before retirement. Some people are naturally resistant to various anesthesia drugs, others are far more sensitive, just by nature and/or disease. Others get their by training their systems, like drug addicts or alcoholics. I once proceeded to put a man to sleep who had admitted to on average 2 six packs a day. Knowing he would have built up many enzymes that would metabolize anesthesia drugs as well as alcohol, I proceeded to give him a double dose. When I started to place the breathing tube, I quickly observed that rather than sleeping, he was wide awake, laughing and with slurred speech telling me "Sh** doc, that **** is good, give me some more!". So I gave him some more, and some more, finally ended up with the mask on him trying to breath him down with the gas like we normally do with kids. The amount of drugs I had already given him would likely have killed some folks, but I had not even knocked him out. That doesn't perfectly apply to our situation with ABs, because this guy was not naturally resistant, he had just trained his body to be so. But some people are born resistant to anesthesia drugs, and would be hard to kill with those drugs. Others are very sensitive to them. If I killed off all of the sensitive ones with high enough doses of anesthesia, all the would be left to reproduce, and pass on their resistance to off spring, would be the resistant ones. We have been doing this for decades with ABs.