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Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument
The excessive and improper use of antibiotics has led to an increasing incidence of bacterial resistance. In Europe the yearly number of infections caused by multidrug resistant bacteria is more than 400.000, each year resulting in 25.000 attributable deaths. Few new antibiotics are in the pipeline...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Hindawi Publishing Corporation
2014
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4020481/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24868534 http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/621316 |
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author | Verbeken, Gilbert Huys, Isabelle Pirnay, Jean-Paul Jennes, Serge Chanishvili, Nina Scheres, Jacques Górski, Andrzej De Vos, Daniel Ceulemans, Carl |
author_facet | Verbeken, Gilbert Huys, Isabelle Pirnay, Jean-Paul Jennes, Serge Chanishvili, Nina Scheres, Jacques Górski, Andrzej De Vos, Daniel Ceulemans, Carl |
author_sort | Verbeken, Gilbert |
collection | PubMed |
description | The excessive and improper use of antibiotics has led to an increasing incidence of bacterial resistance. In Europe the yearly number of infections caused by multidrug resistant bacteria is more than 400.000, each year resulting in 25.000 attributable deaths. Few new antibiotics are in the pipeline of the pharmaceutical industry. Early in the 20th century, bacteriophages were described as entities that can control bacterial populations. Although bacteriophage therapy was developed and practiced in Europe and the former Soviet republics, the use of bacteriophages in clinical setting was neglected in Western Europe since the introduction of traditional antibiotics. Given the worldwide antibiotic crisis there is now a growing interest in making bacteriophage therapy available for use in modern western medicine. Despite the growing interest, access to bacteriophage therapy remains highly problematic. In this paper, we argue that the current state of affairs is morally unacceptable and that all stakeholders (pharmaceutical industry, competent authorities, lawmakers, regulators, and politicians) have the moral duty and the shared responsibility towards making bacteriophage therapy urgently available for all patients in need. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4020481 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2014 |
publisher | Hindawi Publishing Corporation |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-40204812014-05-27 Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument Verbeken, Gilbert Huys, Isabelle Pirnay, Jean-Paul Jennes, Serge Chanishvili, Nina Scheres, Jacques Górski, Andrzej De Vos, Daniel Ceulemans, Carl Biomed Res Int Research Article The excessive and improper use of antibiotics has led to an increasing incidence of bacterial resistance. In Europe the yearly number of infections caused by multidrug resistant bacteria is more than 400.000, each year resulting in 25.000 attributable deaths. Few new antibiotics are in the pipeline of the pharmaceutical industry. Early in the 20th century, bacteriophages were described as entities that can control bacterial populations. Although bacteriophage therapy was developed and practiced in Europe and the former Soviet republics, the use of bacteriophages in clinical setting was neglected in Western Europe since the introduction of traditional antibiotics. Given the worldwide antibiotic crisis there is now a growing interest in making bacteriophage therapy available for use in modern western medicine. Despite the growing interest, access to bacteriophage therapy remains highly problematic. In this paper, we argue that the current state of affairs is morally unacceptable and that all stakeholders (pharmaceutical industry, competent authorities, lawmakers, regulators, and politicians) have the moral duty and the shared responsibility towards making bacteriophage therapy urgently available for all patients in need. Hindawi Publishing Corporation 2014 2014-04-29 /pmc/articles/PMC4020481/ /pubmed/24868534 http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/621316 Text en Copyright © 2014 Gilbert Verbeken et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Verbeken, Gilbert Huys, Isabelle Pirnay, Jean-Paul Jennes, Serge Chanishvili, Nina Scheres, Jacques Górski, Andrzej De Vos, Daniel Ceulemans, Carl Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title | Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title_full | Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title_fullStr | Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title_full_unstemmed | Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title_short | Taking Bacteriophage Therapy Seriously: A Moral Argument |
title_sort | taking bacteriophage therapy seriously: a moral argument |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4020481/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24868534 http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/621316 |
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