Definition: Drug-resistant diseases are caused by organisms that cannot be treated with drugs that once cured the disease. These organisms, usually bacteria, are said to be drug resistant. Drug-resistant superbugs are estimated to cost the United States around $5 billion annually in longer hospital stays and more expensive drugs. Infamous drug-resistant bacteria are:
- Extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis, called XDR TB, which is virtually untreatable with the drugs that are used to treat regular tuberculosis.
- Acinetobacter baumannii is another bacteria whose difficult to treat drug-resistant strains are making news among soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan.
- Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus, MRSA, is another bacteria that is usually caught as a nosocomial infection, or a community-acquired infection and is difficult to treat with the drugs that used to eradicate the organism from the body.
- One of the latest drug-resistant bacteria to join this field is gonorrhea, which is now resistant to treatment with penicillin, tetracyclines, and is increasingly resistant to azithromycin and fluoroquinolones like ciprofloxacin.
Drug resistance does not mean a disease is impossible to cure with the drugs we have today, but treatment is difficult. In addition, some second-line drugs used to treat drug-resistant strains of disease-causing organisms may be more toxic than the first-line treatment options.
Sources:
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Media Relations: Facts About Drug Resistant Gonorrhea. Retrieved September 12, 2007.
Bad Bugs, No Drugs. As Antibiotic Discovery Stagnates, A Public Health Crisis Brews. Infectious Diseases Society of America. July 2004.