Antibiotics Videos

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Antibiotics, also known as antibacterials, are types of medications that destroy or slow down the growth of bacteria.

The Greek word anti means "against", and the Greek word bios means "life" (bacteria are life forms).

Antibiotics are used to treat infections caused by bacteria. Bacteria are microscopic organisms, some of which may cause illness. The word bacteria is the plural of bacterium.

Such illnesses as syphilis, tuberculosis, salmonella, and some forms of meningitis are caused by bacteria. Some bacteria are harmless, while others are good for us.

Contents of this article:

1. What are antibiotics?
2. How do antibiotics work?
3. What are antibiotics used for?
4. What are the side-effects of antibiotics?
5. Allergic reactions to antibiotics
6. Antibiotics may clash (interact) with other medicines
7. How to use antibiotics

8. What are antibiotics?

   The US National Library of Medicine¹ says that antibiotics - powerful medicines that fight bacterial infections - can save lives when used properly. Antibiotics either stop bacteria from reproducing or kill them. "Your body's natural defenses can usually take it from there."
   Before bacteria can multiply and cause symptoms, the body's immune system can usually destroy them. We have special white blood cells that attack harmful bacteria. Even if symptoms do occur, our immune system can usually cope and fight off the infection. There are occasions, however, when it is all too much and some help is needed.....from antibiotics.
   
   Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin, the first natural antibiotic, in 1928.
   The first antibiotic was penicillin. Such penicillin-related antibiotics as ampicillin, amoxicillin and benzylpenicilllin are widely used today to treat a variety of infections - these antibiotics have been around for a long time.
   There are several different types of modern antibiotics and they are only available with a doctor's prescription in most countries.
   Overusing antibiotics - There is concern worldwide that antibiotics are being overused. Antibiotic overuse is one of the factors that contributes towards the growing number of bacterial infections which are becoming resistant to antibacterial medications.
   According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), outpatient antibiotic overuse in the USA is a particular problem in the Southeast.
   The ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control) says that antibiotic resistance continues to be a serious public health threat worldwide. In a statement issued in 19th November 2012, the ECDC informed that an estimated 25,000 people die each year in the European Union from antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.
   New ECDC data has shown that there has been a considerable increase over the last four years of combined resistance to multiple antibiotics in E. coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae in over one third of EU and EEA (European Economic Area) nations. Consumption of carbapenems, a major class of last-line antibiotics, increased significantly from 2007 to 2010.
   Antibiotic resistance: how has it become a global threat to public health? Then there is the danger that the ignorant man may easily underdose himself and by exposing his microbes to non-lethal quantities of the drug, make them resistant," said Alexander Fleming, speaking in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech in 1945. As predicted almost 70 years ago by the man who discovered the first antibiotic, drug resistance is upon us.