Abstract
The use of phages is an attractive option to battle antibiotic resistant bacteria in certain bacterial infections, but the role of phage ecology in bacterial infections is obscure. Here we surveyed the phage ecology in septicemia, the most severe type of bacterial infection. We observed that the majority of the bacterial isolates from septicemia patients spontaneously secreted phages active against other isolates of the same bacterial strain, but not to the strain causing the disease. Such phages were also detected in the initial blood cultures, indicating that phages are circulating in the blood at the onset of sepsis. The fact that most of the septicemic bacterial isolates carry functional prophages suggests an active role of phages in bacterial infections. Apparently, prophages present in sepsis-causing bacterial clones play a role in clonal selection during bacterial invasion.
Highlights
Septicemia is a serious medical condition where bacteria present in the blood circulatory system provoke an amplified and dysregulated immune response in the individual
In this report we investigated Escherichia coli (Ec), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (Pa), Staphylococcus aureus (Sa) and Klebsiella pneumoniae (Kp) isolates from septicemia patients
Set I samples were analyzed by plating the blood culture sample with the homologous bacterial strain
Summary
Septicemia is a serious medical condition where bacteria present in the blood circulatory system provoke an amplified and dysregulated immune response in the individual. Rapid antibiotic intervention is currently the only way to treat septicemia (as well as other bacterial infections). One potentially useful method for the treatment of antibiotic resistant bacterial infections employs bacterial viruses called bacteriophages ( known as phages) capable of killing bacteria [4,5,6,7]. They were widely used to treat bacterial infections since their discovery in the beginning of the twentieth century, but their use was neglected in western countries after the discovery of antibiotics [6,8]. Phage derived enzymes lytic to Gram-positive bacteria are the most promising candidates to enter the markets for therapeutic use [10,11]
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