World Health Organization (WHO) data quotes that Antibiotic resistance also known as Antimicrobial Resistance is one of the biggest threats to global health, food security and development in modern time. On the similar ground during Covid Pandemic, me and my senior were having intense discussion regarding scary complications that are caused due to antibiotics consumption. The above discussion was an outcome of an unexpected event that took place with one of our fellow doctors during first wave of Covid Pandemic 2020.
During the unforgiving and hectic hours of Covid, our colleague collapsed suddenly on duty and after 18 days of hospitalization she was declared dead. The chronology of event started with rushing her to the emergency ward and later to Intensive care unit. Progression of events were unexpected and shocking which made us dive deep into the clinical history of our fellow deceased colleague in order to find out the root cause of unfortunate event. Our beloved colleague apart from being an extraordinary pediatrician, was also a fitness freak, nutritionist, sleep counsellor and last but not the least, a meditation and a Yoga practitioner.
Now, majority of us reading this article, would have found this narration shocking to an extent, right? After all a fit person succumbing to death that too due to antibiotics? How is this even possible? Treatment given may not have been of an appropriate mark? Or can be a mere case of medical negligence? Let’s not assume, rather let me dive you further into this.
Fast forward 2 months later her funeral, we found out that our beloved colleague used to consume antibiotics frequently as frequent as binge watching series on OTT. Isn’t it depressing? Wondering how antibiotics can cause such a huge loss?
Hold on to your nerves and tighten your chest as I fasten your seat belt to a journey where this article consisting of parts on “Code Red for Antibiotics” will persuade you to think twice before you consume antibiotics. “Code Red for Antibiotics” is a write up by a colleague of a beloved friend who lost her life to a less commonly known medical terminology, “Antimicrobial Resistance”, also known as or “Antibiotic Resistance”. Motive of writing this vlog is to create awareness and prevent further such mishaps.
So, Vital Voyager’s.
Let’s start from scratch,
We have two words – Antibiotic and Resistance. Biotic means anything that has life and Anti means against it. It means antibiotics are that class of medicines that works against living entities present inside human body that are harmful in nature. For e.g. we might have suffered from food infection at some stage of our life or at least might have seen somebody suffering from dysentery or diarrhea, ever wondered how it is caused? What can be the potential causative agents?
The cause is consumption of contaminated food with harmful organisms that causes food infection. These organisms can be virus, bacteria or fungi. These harmful microbes enter our body through infected food items and later starts multiplying and building colonies that hamper’s our immunity to a much greater extent. In such case, we reach out to a doctor who decides on whether antibiotics is to be prescribed or not. Prescription of antibiotics leads to its consumption and if these antibiotics consumed in excess or misused or doses are missed may lead to a response mechanism known as Antibiotic Resistance. These antibiotics which are prescribed to kill those harmful microbes goes in a state of dormancy where even after consuming medicines i.e. antibiotics, the harmful bacteria are not killed, instead they build resistance towards it in a more potent manner and continues to show its harmful effects. Such a scenario is called as “Antibiotic resistance” or “Antimicrobial resistance”. Antibiotics consumed doesn’t work anymore in such cases and the ill person finds no improvement in his or her health, rather health deteriorates gradually. Body stops responding to those antibiotics because the harmful microbes present inside the body adapts to it and build a shield that works as a protective mechanism thereby leading to deterioration of health in totality.
Harmful Microbes if present for longer duration in our system will lead to formation of ‘Superbugs’. Since its a harmful bug, in response we need a very potent remedy. Hence, in our next part we will be dealing with the concept of super bugs and its adverse impacts on health. So Vital voyager’s, next part will give you a glance of visual understanding through diagrams thereby making you have crystal clear clarity on these concepts. Stay tuned, part 2 will soon be posted.