A New Penicillin?

Mark Wainwright

doi:10.3390/antibiotics9030117

Abstract

The spectre of antimicrobial resistance looms very large indeed in the 21st century; the supply of efficacious conventional drugs is short and not guaranteed, for various reasons. It is time to look elsewhere for answers and for protocols which might be used in tandem with our diminishing arsenal in order to protect vital drugs. This could bridge the gap before new development in conventional antimicrobial therapy occurs, or might be a longer-term solution, particularly in the area of infectious disease prophylaxis (conventional-sensitive or -resistant). Reliable and safe protocols have been developed for the use of photoantimicrobials in this respect, offering much greater coverage, in terms of the microbial target, than Fleming ever imagined.

Highlights

The spectre of antimicrobial resistance looms very large in the 21st century; the supply of efficacious conventional drugs is short and not guaranteed, for various reasons
Among the furore concerning our problems with increasing antimicrobial resistance (AMR), there is a thread, usually termed ’The rise of the Superbug’ or something similar, which appears to be regarded as some sort of highly organised, separatist political movement, rather than the organic expression of evolution that it is
It is established that we should decrease the exposure of the microbiome to antimicrobial drugs by prescribing only when necessary, whether for human or animal diseases, with bad examples including the prescription of antibiotics for viral illnesses and antibiotic use in agricultural growth promotion

Summary

The Age of Resistance

Among the furore concerning our problems with increasing antimicrobial resistance (AMR), there is a thread, usually termed ’The rise of the Superbug’ or something similar, which appears to be regarded as some sort of highly organised, separatist political movement, rather than the organic expression of evolution that it is. Officer and Lord O’Neill in the UK, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), UN, and WHO on the broader stage [1]. This is recognised as a complex problem requiring much more than scientific endeavours for its solution. The penicillins in use at the time, V and G, would have presented β-lactamase-type capabilities In later years, this would include penicillin-binding proteins and extended-spectrum β-lactamases, but each of these mechanisms is successful—as is the case with resistance mechanisms against other conventional antimicrobials—because of the single mode/single site of antimicrobial action approach which has predominated throughout the ‘antibiotic era’.