Context
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A group of researchers from Pune and Chandigarh has discovered new “Multi Drug Resistant” bacteria from the scats of vine snake, a mildly venomous reptile, commonly found in Northern Western Ghats.
Key Details about the Multi Drug Resistant bacteria
- The newly-isolated bacteria are resistant to at least 35 types of antibiotics.
- The microorganisms present in scats of animals can very easily come in contact with human beings and other animals through water flow during rainy season and also through air.
Source: The Hindu - The bacteria reported here comes under family Planococcaceae and some species of this family are pathogenic in nature, so it is important to identify the bacteria in snakes because they can cause infectious diseases.
- Recently, it has been observed that the Chinese krait and the Chinese cobra may be the original source of coronavirus. When the researchers performed a more detailed bioinformatics analysis of the sequence of 2019-nCoV, it suggests that this coronavirus might have come from snakes.
- World Health Organization (WHO) recently claimed that 70% of infectious diseases will cause due to microorganisms from wildlife. “So it is better we start a research into that direction and make some anti-biotic medicines, which will be helpful for humans.
- Many bacteria, including those which are multi drug-resistant in snakes, lead to wound infection after the snake bites.
- A few species and strains of Planococcus have been demonstrated to be pathogenic to other animals. Some species lead to an outbreak of necrotic hepatitis in chickens. Some of the species and strains of Planococcus are found in bronchial biopsy in a child with cystic fibrosis.
Back to Basics
Multi Drug Resistant or Multiple drug resistance (MDR)
- Multidrug resistance or multiresistance is antimicrobial resistance shown by a species of microorganism to at least one antimicrobial drug in three or more antimicrobial categories.
- Antimicrobial categories are classifications of antimicrobial agents based on their mode of action and specific to target organisms.
- The MDR types most threatening to public health are MDR bacteria that resist multiple antibiotics; other types include MDR viruses, parasites (resistant to multiple antifungal, antiviral, and antiparasitic drugs of a wide chemical variety).
- This refers to the growing menace of disease-causing germs such as bacteria and fungi, for example, pseudomonas, E.coli, klebsiella, salmonella and TB, which no longer respond to the conventionally used antibiotic drugs. These emerging Multi Drug Resistant ( MDR) germs sicken almost 3 million people across the world every year, and the UNO states that if we do not find drugs to fight and kill these MDR-germs quickly enough, the global death toll could soar to 10 million people by 2050.
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