Certainly,'' Cannon said in an interview. That's what's happening now. It's possible that an epidemic of drug-resistant bacteria could lead to an epidemic like AIDS.'' Infectious disease experts interviewed agreed that Cannon's forecast, though grim, is realistic. The American Society for Microbiology has called drug resistance a public health emergency. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently issued guidelines urging hospitals and doctors to use antibiotics more sparingly to slow the development of drug-resistant strains of germs.
Drugs kill vulnerable strains of germs, but the tough survive and flourish.
The discovery of antibiotics in the first half of the century was considered a triumph of man against microbe. The good pills would wipe out bad germs for good. Enthusiasts predicted a world free of infectious disease. However, the reality is quite different. Already, bacteria that cause pneumonia, dysentery or ear infections are resistant to ordinary antibiotics.