Antibiotics

Hundreds of bacteria in soil can thrive with antibiotics as their sole source of nutrition, Harvard University researchers reported Friday in the journal Science. These bacteria outwit antibiotics in a disturbingly novel way, and now the race is on to figure out just how they do it -- in case more dangerous germs that sicken people could develop the same ability. The next step is to identify the actual genes that let these bacteria devour and degrade antibiotics. Then the question becomes whether that genetic mechanism is something soil bacteria might be able to transfer to human pathogens, thus making them more drug-resistant.

Despite surging cases of infections unresponsive to existing antibiotic drugs, the number of medications under development or receiving approval from the Food and Drug Administration is dwindling and remains "alarmingly low," a new report warns. Most concerning, according to the Infectious Disease Society of America , is the "near absence" of antibiotic candidate drugs capable of combating new strains of bacteria that are uniquely dangerous: These "gram-negative" bacteria are not only resistant to most available antibiotic drugs themselves, they can pass genetic materials on to other bacteria that make them impervious to existing medications as well.

Tyson Foods Inc., the second-largest U.S. chicken producer, said it would discontinue its "Raised Without Antibiotics" label because of uncertainty over regulations. Tyson has asked the Department of Agriculture to clarify labeling and advertising rules, the Springdale, Ark.-based company said. A federal judge ordered Tyson in April to halt ads touting chicken as being "raised without antibiotics" after finding the claims to be misleading.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday warned that the widely prescribed antibiotic azithromycin -- marketed as Zithromax and Zmax -- may cause potentially fatal changes in the heart rhythm of people who are taking medications to treat existing heart arrhythmia or who have a slower-than normal heart beat or magnesium or potassium deficiencies. Patients with a prolonged QT interval, a heart rhythm irregularity that is a risk factor for ventricular arrhythmias, also should avoid use of the antibiotic, the FDA warned . Azithromycin, one of the most commonly prescribed antibiotics, is used to treat bacterial infections such as ear infections in children, urinary infections, bronchitis, pneumonia and chlamydia, a sexually transmitted disease.

A newly identified, antibiotic-resistant strain of a common bacterium is contributing to an increase in relatively hard-to-treat bladder infections in women in at least three U.S. cities, according to a study published Thursday. Genetic analysis and other laboratory tests pinpointed the strain of Escherichia coli bacteria as the culprit in a substantial percentage of drug-resistant urinary tract infections among female university students in Berkeley, Minneapolis and Ann Arbor, Mich.

I suffer from digestive upset when taking antibiotics, and I'd like to counter that with the probiotic bacteria in yogurt. Does taking antibiotics with yogurt affect absorption of antibiotics? It depends to a certain extent on the antibiotic, but many should not be taken within a few hours of yogurt or other calcium-rich foods. That includes antibiotics in the tetracycline family and drugs such as ciprofloxacin and norfloxacin, but not ofloxacin. Fruit juice fortified with calcium also can interfere with antibiotic absorption.

In the nation's largest-ever trademark infringement award, a Los Angeles jury Tuesday ordered pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. to pay a British company $143 million for stealing the Trovan name to market its controversial antibiotic. Legal experts called the verdict "staggering," saying it raises the stakes for companies that deliberately infringe other companies' trademarks. Jurors said Pfizer, the second-largest U.S.

Japanese and European researchers have identified a new strain of Neisseria gonorroeae that is exceptionally resistant to cephalosporins, the last remaining family of antibiotics available to treat the sexually transmitted disease. Although physicians have identified only a handful of infections by the new strain of gonorrhea, called H041, they fear that its ability to grow even in the presence of the cephalosporins may allow it to spread rapidly throughout the world. "This is a large public health problem and the era of untreatable gonorrhea may now have been initiated," the team wrote in their abstract for the report presented Sunday at a Quebec City meeting of the International Society for Sexually Transmitted Disease Research.

For most people who contract Lyme disease - a bacterial infection borne by ticks - a course of antibiotics does the trick. But for some, especially those who live in areas like the Northeast U.S., where Lyme disease is particularly common, the infection comes back. That raises questions about whether the disease is recurring - a single infection leading to multiple bouts with symptoms - or if reinfection is occurring, meaning the patient is unlucky enough to have been bit again. Now a new study, published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine , appears to lay the question to rest: Such patients are reinfected, and Lyme disease does not appear to recur after successful courses of antibiotics.

In the last few months, I have been put on various drugs for sinus problems. These include antibiotics like Tequin and Levaquin as well as prednisone. The prednisone made me squirrelly, so I stopped it with my doctor's OK. I was given another course of Levaquin for a bladder infection and started feeling panicky. Then my doctor put me on Zoloft to combat anxiety. Next, I began having full-blown panic attacks and a bout of depression.

Describing the routine use of antibiotics in meat and poultry production as a "serious threat to public health," the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2010 called on livestock operations to voluntarily reduce their reliance on the medications. But an FDA report this month indicates that, so far, the results are unimpressive: Antibiotic sales to livestock operations rose in 2011, rather than falling. It is unclear why the numbers went up - perhaps there were simply more animals - and in fact, new legislation seeks to require better information on this score.

A new study has found that an infusion of feces from a healthy person into an ailing patient's gut was significantly more effective than a traditional antibiotic treatment - raising hopes that the unconventional approach could one day help combat obesity, food allergies and a host of other maladies. The study, published online Wednesday by the New England Journal of Medicine, demonstrated that the fecal transplant cleared up a recurrent bacterial infection far more reliably than the routinely prescribed medication.

A Consumer Reports analysis of American pork purchased in grocery and specialty stores has found that many samples contained high levels of a bacterium that causes food poisoning. More worrisome, much of the bacteria samples were resistant to antibiotics. According to the report, the magazine tested 148 samples of pork chops and 50 samples of ground pork for harmful bacteria from a wide range of stores in six American cities. (The stores are listed in the report, which can be found on the Consumer Reports website.)

For most people who contract Lyme disease - a bacterial infection borne by ticks - a course of antibiotics does the trick. But for some, especially those who live in areas like the Northeast U.S., where Lyme disease is particularly common, the infection comes back. That raises questions about whether the disease is recurring - a single infection leading to multiple bouts with symptoms - or if reinfection is occurring, meaning the patient is unlucky enough to have been bit again. Now a new study, published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine , appears to lay the question to rest: Such patients are reinfected, and Lyme disease does not appear to recur after successful courses of antibiotics.

Patterns of antibiotic overuse vary in the U.S. vary by region, with residents of some Southeastern states taking about twice as many antibiotics per capita as residents in some Western states. According to the Washington-based Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy , Kentucky, West Virginia, Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana were the states with the highest rates of antibiotic use in 2010. Those states had more than one antibiotic prescription per capita in 2010.  The states with the lowest use of antibiotics that year were Alaska, Hawaii, California, Oregon and Washington, with just over one prescription for every two people.  Overall, the rate of antibiotic prescriptions in the U.S. declined from 966 prescriptions for each 1,000 residents in 1999 to 801 in 2010.

I've never met anyone who buys organic food to get more vitamins and minerals, so it's unclear why the public has been treated to a series of studies -- most recently a meta-review out of Stanford University -- telling us that for the most part organics don't have more vitamins and minerals. As a Times editorial pointed out last week, consumers buy organic to avoid ingesting common agricultural chemicals and to prevent those chemicals from harming the environment. Pesticide levels in organic food were found to be significantly lower.

Describing the routine use of antibiotics in meat and poultry production as a "serious threat to public health," the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2010 called on livestock operations to voluntarily reduce their reliance on the medications. But an FDA report this month indicates that, so far, the results are unimpressive: Antibiotic sales to livestock operations rose in 2011, rather than falling. It is unclear why the numbers went up - perhaps there were simply more animals - and in fact, new legislation seeks to require better information on this score.

While " 'Super Bugs' Have Invaded Our Meat" (Opinion, Nov. 5), on the overuse of antibiotics in food-animal production, was enlightening, the article failed to emphasize one key point: The deplorable, unhealthy conditions in which the animals are often raised is what necessitates much of the use of the antibiotics. Even if one is not concerned about the rights or welfare of the creatures involved, meat eaters are well-advised to realize sooner rather than later that what is good for the animals is good for humans too. Christina J. Johnson Long Beach

LOMPOC, Calif. - A new beef vendor at the Santa Monica farmers market, Rancho San Julian is very likely the oldest continuously operated family farm in California, dating to 1816, when José de la Guerra began to raise meat for the presidio at Santa Barbara. In 1837, the governor of Alta California granted him title to the ranch, which has remained in his family for nine generations. It currently extends over 13,000 acres of grasslands and oak forest, roamed by cougars, bears and hawks, and home to 500 Angus cows and their calves.

Efforts by doctors and public health experts to rein in the use of antibiotics in children appear to be working, according to a new study that shows a 14% decline in pediatric prescriptions for those drugs between 2002 and 2010. As many as half of the antibiotics taken in this country are taken inappropriately - to treat infections caused by viruses instead of bacteria, for example. In these cases, the drugs don't help patients, but they do help bacteria build resistance to the drugs.