The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill B acteria are striking back against the antibiotics that once were effective in fighting infections. The result is that infectious diseases are becoming more common and more complex, according to the New England Journal of Medicine. For decades, our first line of defense against infectious diseases has been a group of medicines called antibiotics. Examples of common antibiotics are penicillin and erythromycin.
Antibiotics kill the bacteria that cause infections.
The infection that is being treated may get worse and require a more powerful antibiotic in the future. The more powerful antibiotics reserved for treating only the very serious infections in the past are now being needed to treat more common infections. Since people are now being prescribed these powerful antibiotics more often, there is a greater chance that their bodies will be resistant. If this problem keeps getting worse, there won't be anything left to treat the more serious infections. Today, simple infections like sore throats or ear infections that were once easily treatable may lead to death because of this resistance.