• Question: Has any advancement in antibiotics been made to kill flesh-eating viruses in hospitals?

    Asked by Emmie to Christopher, Aaron, Ananthi, Ashley, Emma on 15 Nov 2017.
    • Photo: Aaron Brown

      Aaron Brown answered on 15 Nov 2017:

      I’m afraid I’m not really sure 🙁 as an environmental microbiologist I don’t study these kind of things….

    • Photo: Ananthi Ramachandran

      Ananthi Ramachandran answered on 15 Nov 2017:

      In Eastern Europe (countries like Poland, Georgia and Russia) they use the viruses that I work with (bacteriophages- viruses that attack bacteria) to coat bandages and wound dressings to fight skin infections (from bacteria) in this way!

    • Photo: Emma Stevenson

      Emma Stevenson answered on 15 Nov 2017:

      Ananthi has this question covered I think. There are lots of researchers looking at viruses to target specific bacteria, so you never know. Someone might be working on something to combat the flesh eating one.

    • Photo: Christopher Richardson

      Christopher Richardson answered on 16 Nov 2017:

      In antibiotics no not so much has been discovered. The research now is more focused on the prevention of these flesh eating infections happening! Hopefully if they can stop the bacteria before it infects then that is easier than trying to treat someone who has it! there have been major advances in this area, with the NHS pumping millions of pounds into using bandages that have a thin layer of mesh covered in actual silver in them as silver has been proven to contain certain chemicals and compounds that are antibacterial and kill flesh eating bacteria!

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