Fighting deadly bacteria resistant to drugs in the intestines with a new antibiotic

A new antibiotic developed by a Flinders University researcher is considered a breakthrough in the war against a drug-resistant superbug.

Bacteria are gaining the fight against antibiotics as they evolve to fight traditional treatments, threatening decades of progress in modern medicine, with predictions of killing more than 10 million people by 2050.

The scientific development of new, effective and safe antibiotics is crucial to cope with the growing threat of drug-resistant bacteria worldwide.

Clostridium difficile Infection (CDI) is a life-threatening infection in the large intestine, more common in people who need to take antibiotics for a long time, especially in Australia's aging population.

Dr. Ramiz Boulos, an badociate researcher at Flinders University and general manager of Boulos & Cooper Pharmaceuticsals, says the fact that CDI is becoming resistant to traditional antibiotics is alarming and highlights the need to develop more effective treatments.

"Cases of CDI disease are increasing and strains become more deadly.In case of intestinal imbalance, it can begin to develop and release toxins that attack the lining of the intestine and cause symptoms," explains Dr. Boulos.

During the last ten years, various strains of It's hard have emerged and are badociated with epidemics of serious infections worldwide. A particular strain is easily transmitted between people and has been responsible for major outbreaks in hospitals in the United States and Europe.

"This is disturbing when you consider that CDI is one of the most common infections contracted during hospital visits in the Western Hemisphere and the most likely cause of diarrhea among patients and hospital staff. . "

But when doses of a new antibiotic called Ramizol were administered to hamsters infected with a lethal dose of the bacteria, a significant proportion of hamsters survived the infection.

In a recent safety study in rats evaluating the effect of repeated exposure to the antibiotic, no rats experienced serious adverse effects or changes weight.

"Our research indicates that Ramizol is an extremely well-tolerated antibiotic in rats, has good microbiology and good antioxidant properties, is also chemically stable, and is scalable due to low manufacturing cost. who could make it a viable treatment. "

Forty-eight rats received a high dose of a new type of antibiotic for 14 days to evaluate its safety.

The research, which was undertaken jointly by Boulos & Cooper Pharmaceuticals, Product Safety Labs and ToxStrategies in the United States and the University of Flinders, was recently published in the journal Scientific reports.

"We are satisfied with these results for two reasons: first, we were able to administer a very high dose to rats without mortality or side effects,"

"In addition, there was no change in average body weight, weight gain, food consumption or feed efficiency for male and female rats attributable to Ramizol."

"We believe that Ramizol could be the standard of treatment for the treatment of ICD and could be a star drug."

Provided by
Flinders University