[Simple] Killer superbug solution discovered in Norway

[mbig]

I think we've all known this is the right way to do it for many years-- instead of throwing pills.
True with many drugs from antibiotics to anti-malarials.

Killer superbug solution discovered in Norway - Infectious diseases- msnbc.com

Killer superbug solution discovered in Norway
Nation cutting back significantly on use of antibiotics
By Martha Mendoza/Margie Mason
Dec 31, 2009

EDITOR'S NOTE — Once-curable diseases such as tuberculosis and malaria are coming back, as germs rapidly mutate to form aggressive strains that resist drugs. The reason: The misuse of the very drugs that were supposed to save us has built up drug resistance worldwide. Last in a five-part series.

OSLO, Norway - Aker University Hospital is a dingy place to heal. The floors are streaked and scratched. A light layer of dust coats the blood pressure monitors. A faint stench of urine and bleach wafts from a pile of soiled bedsheets dropped in a corner.

Look closer, however, at a microscopic level, and this place is pristine. There is no sign of a dangerous and contagious staph infection that killed tens of thousands of patients in the most sophisticated hospitals of Europe, North America and Asia this year, soaring virtually unchecked.

The reason: Norwegians stopped taking so many drugs.
[.......]

 

[Antagony]

Yes, I remember reading about the overuse of antibiotics becoming a huge problem over twenty years ago. Not only has nothing changed since then, the situation has become progressively worse.

Medicine is clearly an area where capitalism does not work. Pharmaceutical companies have a vested interest in selling more and more pills, regardless of any long-term detriments to either individual patients or society as a whole. But it's not just in medicine where this problem lies: the routine use of non-therapeutic drugs in farmed animals has contributed massively to the problem. IIRC, something like 70% of all drugs administered to farm-reared animals are preventative rather than curative. Is it any wonder we're losing the war to bacteria?