Have you ever used an antibiotic? I bet we all have. They come in different forms; tablets, injections or creams. Most of us, despite continuous usage, are not so familiar with what antibiotics really are and how they carry out the work they are sent to do. This has led to abuse and further complication.
Well no more, as you about to find out a whole lot about antibiotics!
What they really are
Antibiotics are special medicines designed solely to attack bacteria. They either destroy them or stop their growth. Bacteria are one of the domains of organisms referred to as Prokaryotes. They are complex in nature and can survive in different environment, both in the human body and other environments that are even unthinkable. Bacteria can be both helpful and well, not so helpful. An example of those times where they are not so helpful, is when they cause infections. They invade our bodies, multiply and sometimes produce harmful toxins. This is where antibiotics come in. They help to ward off their effect. They are really so helpful and below is an insight into the good role they play in our bodies.
The Good
When you get a bacterial infection, antibiotics play a really great role in helping out. Before antibiotics was discovered by Alexander Fleming, bacterial infections was one of the leading cause of death. So many people died and no one could figure out a way out until Alexander did, although accidentally.
Today, there are so many antibiotics in use that take care of bacterial infections. Like earlier mentioned, antibiotics do their good work by either destroying bacteria or inhibiting their growth. Different antibiotics have different ways of doing this. Here’s a little explanation…
Beta-lactam Antibiotics
Bacteria usually have a mechanism of survival. They build up a cell wall. They do so by linking up their molecules. Antibiotics known as Beta-lactams stop bacteria from forming cell walls. This leads to pressure inside the cell hence causing the death of the bacteria. Examples of such, are those antibiotics in the Penicillin and Cephalosporin family.
Macrolides
These form of antibiotics act on the ribosome of bacteria. The job of ribosome is simply building up of proteins. Proteins are pretty important especially since they are responsible for almost everything that happens within a cell. Antibiotics that are macrolides, identify bacterial ribosomes and block them or stop them from producing proteins.
No ribosomes = no proteins which means no survival of bacteria. Guess the antibiotic responsible for this? Erythromycin!
Quinolones
When you get a bacterial infection, the bacteria involved replicates by copying their DNA. Quinolones stop this process by breaking the DNA strands and not just that, it stops every effort made to repair the DNA strands. Just in case you do not know, no intact DNA, no survival of bacteria, hence the antibiotic wins!
Ciprofloxacin is an example of a quinolone.
Now we are a little familiar with all the good antibiotics do. How about the bad, oh yes there is a bad side to it… Here it is.
The Bad
One thing to note is, like earlier mentioned, bacteria are not all bad. There are some helpful bacteria in our bodies. There are some of them on our skin, our intestines, the vagina, the gut and even in our nose. These microbes help out in different ways ranging from digestion to stopping the growth of harmful microbes.
Now, most times, because of how good antibiotics are, and our history with them, we tend to abuse them by taking either the wrong ones, too little or too much of them. This is really bad because the antibiotics sometimes turn around to affect those good microbes in our bodies.
Although not a 100% effective, doctors prescribe antibiotics with the knowledge and intention of avoiding causing harm to the good bacteria in our bodies. So they prescribe antibiotics in doses that are not harmful to the good bacteria. But when we take them without a prescription, we could end up taking too much which could be harmful to those helpful bacteria in our bodies.
The Bad aspect does not end with causing harm to the helpful bacteria only. There is also the issue of Antibiotics Resistance. Overuse of antibiotics for treatment of infection leads to a situation where the bacteria gets too used to the antibiotic and the effect range from minimal damage to no effect at all.
It is just like you are skilled in knife fighting, and then everyday you are facing the same opponent showing the same skills all the time. Very soon, your opponent gets used to your skill and you can no longer defeat him or her.
Same thing goes with antibiotics. This has led to continuous search and unending development of different types of antibiotics. Ask any lab scientist, Antimicrobial Sensitivity testing these days are no longer encouraging.
Then there are the side effects. Do you know there is a certain antibiotic that has deafness as its side effect? Antibiotics are good and all, but sometimes the side effects they come with is almost as bad as the infection itself.
Misconceptions
I have an infection, I need an antibiotic!
Not all infections are caused by bacteria. Viruses and fungi also cause infections. Antibiotics are produced to have harmful effects on bacteria alone. They could be broad spectrum; having effect on a wide range of bacteria while others are narrow spectrum, specific for one bacteria alone. The main point is, antibiotics are meant to treat bacterial infections alone. There are antiviral and anti-fungal drugs for viral and fungal infections respectively. Using an antibiotic for a fungal infection would just be pretty much a waste of time and resources.
Stop usage when symptoms disappear
When you use an antibiotic, it is important to finish the dosage prescribed for you. Do not stop the treatment just because the symptoms have disappeared. The causative microbe has not, and stopping treatment only means they would have time to recover and stage a stronger attack.
In conclusion, since their discovery, antibiotics have indeed been very helpful to mankind. But we are quickly taking away their effectiveness by abusing them. Sadly, researchers can barely keep up with producing new ones as most of the existing ones are now failing.
Sure, it is necessary to take them once in a while. But just make sure you are doing it the right way. It is important we stop the abuse in order to keep Antibiotics around much longer.
Thanks for reading!
References
What are Bacteria
How Antibiotics work
Dangers of Antibiotics