Washington Post: A new superbug requires urgent attention
Editorial Board

“…Antibiotics are a pillar of modern medicine and have saved lives for decades, but the rise of resistance threatens a back-to-the-future moment when small infections could become fatal, as they once were. This reckoning was postponed for a long time because a robust pipeline of new antibiotics was discovered and brought to market. But then the flow began to dry up. Antibiotics are often not as profitable as other drugs, making costly development less attractive for pharmaceutical companies. The Pew Charitable Trusts and the World Health Organization published analyses in December of the worldwide pipeline of products in clinical development with the potential to treat drug-resistant infections, and they called the findings ‘grim.’ They said too few new antibiotics are under development, and too few represent new classes of drugs. … Just as vital, the overuse of antibiotics in human and animal health must be curbed. Fortunately, there is more attention these days to providing better stewardship of existing drugs. No less is at stake than preserving these miracle medicines, now and for future generations” (2/25).