But there are encouraging signs that if doctors and patients change their behavior, they may be able to slow the spread of drug-resistant bugs. In Finland, national changes in antibiotic use reversed a rise in antibiotic-resistant strep bacteria. Such behavior changes are urgently needed, experts say. In hospitals, resistant organisms cause longer hospital stays and higher mortality. Already, some infections in severely ill patients defy treatment even with vancomycin, long reserved as the drug of last resort for certain hospital-acquired bacteria.
Staph bacteria are a frequent cause of infection in burns, skin and surgical wounds.
Experts warn that if vancomycin resistance develops in this common type of bacteria, it will pose a dangerous medical problem. ''I think it's important to be aware of this before we do reach the end of the rope,'' said Morton N. Swartz, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. In addition, fruit growers sometimes use these powerful drugs. Antibiotic resistance develops because the drugs change the environment of bacteria, killing sensitive strains and conferring a survival advantage on germs.