The drug industry became a billion dollar business, filling the pharmacy shelves daily with new and more powerful antibiotics. But as we approach the millennium, some in the scientific community are questioning whether we have created a Trojan Horse instead of a magic bullet. Resistant strains of diseases, thought to be eradicated, are emerging throughout the world. Invincible viruses are spreading their death and destruction at a rapid pace. One of these, fostered and promoted by the very institutions that are dedicated to lifesaving, is pseudomembranous colitis.
Pseudomembranous colitis is a severe inflammation of the inner lining of the colon.
It causes the formation of an overlying fibrous pseudomembrane due to fluid composes of fibrin, leukocytes and necrotic cells that collects there. The name derives from the presence of characteristic discrete yellow plaques or pseudomembranes, which measure up to 2cm in diameter and are scattered over a variable length of colonic mucosa. Pseudomembranous colitis is caused by Clostridium difficile, one of the most infamous intestinal pathogens in developed countries, in terms of prevalence and severity. It affects millions of people annually. It is an opportunist infection which can be transmitted nosocomially.