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Bacteria Discovered In Irish Soil Kills Four Drug-Resistant Superbugs (msn.com)
NBC News reports on how microbiologist Gerry Quinn "followed up on some folklore his family had passed on to him."
Old timers insisted that the dirt in the vicinity of a nearly 1,500-year-old church in County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland, an area once occupied by the Druids, had almost miraculous curative powers.... "Here in the western fringes of Ireland there is still a tradition of having this folk cure," Quinn told NBC News. "We can look at it and see maybe it's just superstition -- or we can actually investigate and ask, 'is there anything in the soil that produces antibiotics...?'"
Once Quinn and his team decided to focus on the Irish soil, they narrowed their search to a specific type of bacteria, called Streptomyces, because other strains of this bacteria have led to the development of 75 percent of existing antibiotics, Quinn said. The bacteria was discovered by a team based at Swansea University Medical School, made up of researchers from Wales, Brazil, Iraq and Northern Ireland. The researchers first tried the newly discovered strain of Streptomyces on some garden variety bacteria. In their petri dish experiment, "it knocked them out," Quinn said. "Then we thought we'd take it one step further and find some multi-resistant organisms."
The bacteria in the experiment killed four out of the top six organisms that are resistant to antibiotics, including MRSA. "It's quite surprising," said Quinn... "The lesson is, some of the cures are right underneath your feet."
Vaughn Cooper, an evolutionary geneticist/microbiologist at the University of Pittsburgh's School of Medicine, tells NBC that more research is needed before this yields a super-antibiotic -- but "it's a cool discovery."
The World Health Organization has named antibiotic resistance as one of 2019's ten top public health threats.
Once Quinn and his team decided to focus on the Irish soil, they narrowed their search to a specific type of bacteria, called Streptomyces, because other strains of this bacteria have led to the development of 75 percent of existing antibiotics, Quinn said. The bacteria was discovered by a team based at Swansea University Medical School, made up of researchers from Wales, Brazil, Iraq and Northern Ireland. The researchers first tried the newly discovered strain of Streptomyces on some garden variety bacteria. In their petri dish experiment, "it knocked them out," Quinn said. "Then we thought we'd take it one step further and find some multi-resistant organisms."
The bacteria in the experiment killed four out of the top six organisms that are resistant to antibiotics, including MRSA. "It's quite surprising," said Quinn... "The lesson is, some of the cures are right underneath your feet."
Vaughn Cooper, an evolutionary geneticist/microbiologist at the University of Pittsburgh's School of Medicine, tells NBC that more research is needed before this yields a super-antibiotic -- but "it's a cool discovery."
The World Health Organization has named antibiotic resistance as one of 2019's ten top public health threats.
Drunken Irish bacteria are good fighters
A gift from the Irish. WE need all the good news we can get today... CC
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again: not the same thing
I'll avoid being kiled by incompitent "scientists" and stick to the best method to preserve helth and happyness. reading my bible and praying
I can see where this is going.
The profit-driven pharmaceutical industry is going to capture this bacteria, culture it, and formulate some new medication that will "save thousands of lives."
Everyone happy, right?
Maybe. That's not the end. Right now that magical cure is "right underneath your feet" (TFA). What they will ignore are those bacteria are part of a complex ecosystem where the parts are interconnected and dependent on each other. But they can't package and make a profit on an ecosystem just some molecule or gene sequence that they can isolate and mass produce to have some immediate effect.
Then they will proceed to hype the threat, scaring hundreds of millions into thinking they must have their product or die a horrible death.
Result: it will be way over-prescribed and recklessly used (because hey, insurance covers it, right?) so that the harmful pathogens circulating will evolve into something resistant to it. Any side effects of the new wonder drug will be downplayed and anyone pointing any of this out will be ridiculed as anti-science.
You read it here first, folks.
By killing the host organism.
"Tempers are wearing thin. Let's just hope some robot doesn't kill everybody." --Bender
'But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years; for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.'
-- Lord of the Rings
In other news aspirin was extracted from willow bark. Most medications up to the end of the 20th century were derived or extracted from natural sources known about for hundreds (or even thousands) of years.
How long until there is resistant to the new super antibiotic?
this is over used and MRSA et al become resistant to it?
Maybe I can beg my doctor to prescribe it for a viral infection I've got? That would work, right?
So, the macho 'rub some dirt on it' thing actually works if you have special dirt... #themoreyouknow
Hm? He was. By definition.
If one bit of woo is true, then two bits of woo are true. If two bits of woo are true, all woo is true.
You can bet pounds to pigshit that some people are going to interpret this as proof that crystals, homeopathy and pyramids work.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They need to run a proper trial, and then another one.
Why? To be sure, to be sure!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I can't remember where or when I first heard this - it was a long time ago - but it's a toss up between congenital laziness and 'belief' in the 'wisdom of wives' that accounts for my casual attitude towards cleaning / a little bit of dirt.
"A child that hasn't eaten their weight in dirt by the time they're two won't make it past five"
Wtf? why is this on /. ??
gehy
Ugh... Land near a christian church invariably means a graveyard.
this is good news!
a new place we can dump chemical toxins and radioactive waste to let nature solve the problem!
the other places are busy already.
There are enough promising discoveries like this to produce somewhere between 4 and 6 new families of antibiotics. The basic research on several of these candidates was done years ago. All that needs to be done is for a drug company to refine the research and complete the testing process.
The problem is, there is not a lot of money in antibiotics. They tend to make people better after just a few doses. So the drug companies aren't interested.
The next generation is going to have it rough because of the pure greed of this generation. I guess it sucks to be them.
Thinking about it, this would be like deliberately exposing oneself to various pathogens, fungi, bacteria, virii that are endemic to different parts of the country. And this is a sort of primitive immunization protocol, isn't it. If it so happens some temple pond is always infested with cow-pox virus, these pilgrims will get immunity from small pox. Edward Jenner's casual observation "milkmaids who get cow-pox never get small pox" was how the entire vaccination (vacca = cow in Latin) science started.
Looks like they stumbled on to an useful practice by trial and error.
[*] Many variations and pronounciations in various Indian languages.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
bullshit.
Seriously, though--good on the researchers if they've found yet another antibiotic, but...
Everyone here knows this just buys us a (little) time and doesn't address the fundamental issue, right?
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
I hate that type of sensationalism. It's a new strain of antibiotic that hasn't been mass produced so bacteria haven't evolved a resistance to it yet.
Bacteria Discovered In Irish Soil Kills Four Drug-Resistant Superbugs
Although missing from the summary, it also kills potatoes.
You watch the video? dont...
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