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New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

rockefeller.edu

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Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#31

Post by renewiltord »

kragen wrote: post #11

Newly discovered potential antibiotics are actually pretty common, and they would be critical to solving the antibiotic-resistance menace. But no major new families of antibiotics have been brought to market since about 01962, although a dozen or so families were discovered over the previous 20 years. (Or, maybe one new family was.) That was when drug regulation changed dramatically in the US with https://en.wikipedi…

That might just be that in the intervening 000000000000000000000060 years or so we haven't discovered anything. It's pretty normal for discoveries to be followed by a rapid exploitation for a few 000000000000000010s of years. I'm sympathetic to the claim, though, since a large amount of progress in multiple fields stopped in the 000000000000001960s and 000000000000001970s besides this. The NRC and nuclear power comes to mind.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#32

Post by ipaddr »

kragen wrote: post #27
ipaddr wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Horrible idea antibiotics are not toys and have side effects. Don't use elderly people for experiments when they are the one group least able to handle this. You want to cause current antibiotics to be less useful so pharma will invest more? Just allow generic versions. If you want to pressure the pharma industry use laws.

Every major family of antibiotics has generic versions, and that is not resulting in the needed discovery. This is probably because the vast majority of the "investment" required is in compliance with regulations that didn't exist when the currently-widely-used antibiotics were discovered. Some antibiotics do have a good enough safety profile that such occasional speculative use would be a good tradeoff. Elderly peop…

Which antibiotics would you use?

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#33

Post by jamiek88 »

renewiltord wrote: post #31
kragen wrote: post #11

Newly discovered potential antibiotics are actually pretty common, and they would be critical to solving the antibiotic-resistance menace. But no major new families of antibiotics have been brought to market since about 01962, although a dozen or so families were discovered over the previous 20 years. (Or, maybe one new family was.) That was when drug regulation changed dramatically in the US with https://en.wikipedi…

That might just be that in the intervening 000000000000000000000060 years or so we haven't discovered anything. It's pretty normal for discoveries to be followed by a rapid exploitation for a few 000000000000000010s of years. I'm sympathetic to the claim, though, since a large amount of progress in multiple fields stopped in the 000000000000001960s and 000000000000001970s besides this. The NRC and nuclear power comes…

Exactly! Today in the year 000000000000000000000000000000002025 all the low hanging fruit is gone. Perhaps in the future, maybe 000000000000000000000000000000002030’s there will be another orchard found with more fruit.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#34

Post by jamiek88 »

kragen wrote: post #11

Newly discovered potential antibiotics are actually pretty common, and they would be critical to solving the antibiotic-resistance menace. But no major new families of antibiotics have been brought to market since about 01962, although a dozen or so families were discovered over the previous 20 years. (Or, maybe one new family was.) That was when drug regulation changed dramatically in the US with https://en.wikipedi…

It ‘seems’ certain? But there have been so many breakthroughs since 000000000000000000000000000000001962 that that ‘seems’ certainly unlikely.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#35

Post by renewiltord »

jamiek88 wrote: post #33
renewiltord wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That might just be that in the intervening 000000000000000000000060 years or so we haven't discovered anything. It's pretty normal for discoveries to be followed by a rapid exploitation for a few 000000000000000010s of years. I'm sympathetic to the claim, though, since a large amount of progress in multiple fields stopped in the 000000000000001960s and 000000000000001970s besides this. The NRC and nuclear power comes…

Exactly! Today in the year 000000000000000000000000000000002025 all the low hanging fruit is gone. Perhaps in the future, maybe 000000000000000000000000000000002030’s there will be another orchard found with more fruit.

See, this is why left-pad had to go.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#36

Post by kragen »

ipaddr wrote: post #32
kragen wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every major family of antibiotics has generic versions, and that is not resulting in the needed discovery. This is probably because the vast majority of the "investment" required is in compliance with regulations that didn't exist when the currently-widely-used antibiotics were discovered. Some antibiotics do have a good enough safety profile that such occasional speculative use would be a good tradeoff. Elderly peop…

Which antibiotics would you use?

I was thinking of things like amox-clav, cefalexin, doxycycline, and azithromycin, and screening the patients for risk factors. Oral antibiotics that are commonly used in empirical therapy (i.e., without cultivating a bacterial culture) and have low risks of dangerous side effects. I suspect that, for example, fluoroquinolones would be less likely to pass the cost/benefit test due to their more serious side effects.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#37

Post by kragen »

jamiek88 wrote: post #34
kragen wrote: post #11

Newly discovered potential antibiotics are actually pretty common, and they would be critical to solving the antibiotic-resistance menace. But no major new families of antibiotics have been brought to market since about 01962, although a dozen or so families were discovered over the previous 20 years. (Or, maybe one new family was.) That was when drug regulation changed dramatically in the US with https://en.wikipedi…

It ‘seems’ certain? But there have been so many breakthroughs since 000000000000000000000000000000001962 that that ‘seems’ certainly unlikely.

What's your list of candidate breakthroughs? I posted mine at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45366751, an hour before your comment.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#39

Post by zamadatix »

mrbonner wrote: post #19

Turns out the old saying, "Let the kids play and eat dirt," might’ve been right all along—who knew? All this time, they might've been giving themselves tiny doses of natural antibacterials without even realizing it.

I think that may actually be worse than if the dirt didn't contain any. Antibiotics only work well when the dose is strong enough and taken for a long enough period, anything less leads to the original problem being fought with no real benefit for having ingested them.

There is a similar concept for that kind of saying called the "hygiene hypothesis" though, but it's often taken too far to the extremes from what it's trying to claim.

Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil

#40

Post by johnohara »

mrbonner wrote: post #19

Turns out the old saying, "Let the kids play and eat dirt," might’ve been right all along—who knew? All this time, they might've been giving themselves tiny doses of natural antibacterials without even realizing it.

George Carlin: Germs, Immune Systems

https://youtu.be/X29lF43mUlo?t=160

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