Wednesday, April 06, 2022

Bacteria eating Viruses that could save millions of lives

Very recommendable! Good news! Perhaps, bacteriophages will be an effective antidote to antimicrobial resistance!

The article mentions that a pioneering scientist Giorgi Eliava from Georgia was killed by Beria on the order of Stalin. According to the article Beria was from Georgia, but fails to mention that Stalin was from Georgia too:
"It didn't help that the man who did most to develop [bacteriophage], Georgian scientist Giorgi Eliava, was executed in 1937 on the orders of another Georgian, Lavrentiy Beria, Stalin's most notorious henchman and the head of his secret police."

"... This small nation in the Caucasus [Georgia] has pioneered research on a groundbreaking way to tackle the looming nightmare of bacteria becoming resistant to the antibiotics on which the world depends.
Long overlooked in the West, bacteriophages or bacteria-eating viruses are now being used on some of the most difficult medical cases ...
While phages-based medicines cannot completely replace antibiotics, researchers say they have major pluses in being cheap, not having side-effects nor damaging organs or gut flora.
"We produce six standard phages that are of wide spectrum and can heal multiple infectious diseases," ...
In some 10 to 15 percent of patients, however, standard phages don't work and "we have to find ones capable of killing the particular bacterial strain," ...
Tailored phages to target rare infections can be selected from the institute's massive collection -- the world's richest -- or be found in sewage or polluted water or soil  ...
hundreds of patients from around the globe who arrive in Georgia every year for last-resort treatment ...
In 2019, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorised a clinical study on the use of bacteriophages to cure secondary infections in Covid patients.
Beyond medicine, phages are already being used to stop food going off, and they "can be used in agriculture to protect crops and animals from harmful bacteria," ...
Bacteriophages also have potential to counter biological weapons and combat bioterrorism, with Canadian researchers publishing a 2017 study on using them to counter an anthrax attack on crowded public places."

Viruses that could save millions of lives It may seem strange after a pandemic that has killed millions and turned the world upside down, but viruses could save just as many lives.

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