Colistin and the Future for Tso3 For those who fear withdrawal symptoms from not being able to spend their days glued to the stock quotes.
In late April, WAPO published a serie of articles on the discovery on US grounds of a bacteria resistant to every known antibiotics, including colistin, the so-called antibiotic of last-resort. Here are two of the most important pieces.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2016/05/26/the-superbug-that-doctors-have-been-dreading-just-reached-the-u-s/?hpid=hp_no-name_no-name%3Apage%2Fbreaking-news-bar
and
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2016/06/14/superbug-found-in-second-pig-sample-in-u-s/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories-2_superbug-1110am%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
At the same time the CDC issued a bulletin appealing hospitals to make a more judicious use of antibiotics, especially since from 20 to 50% are prescribed without any real justification.
https://www.cdc.gov/getsmart/healthcare/implementation/core-elements.html
Last week JAMA published a paper on the topic.
https://app.jamanetwork.com/#page=issuesContainer
These developments may be considered troubling at the societal level. Yet in a very narrow perspective, an egoistic perspective, they may be considered a positive for the future of Tso3 as the health authorities become even more acutely aware of the risks of those superbugs to spread in hospital environments.
And for the conspiracy theorists out there : since the bacteria resistant to colistin have been first discoved in livestock fed antibiotics in China, could it be that the Chinese are building a potential market ahead for Tso3 ahead of a takeover? (chuckles)