“Superbugs are one of the most serious dangers of our time,” notes The Doomslayer. But “currently, hospital labs can take as long as seven days to specify bacterial infections, while for some infections a definitive diagnosis may take eight weeks.” In the meantime, some patients die.
Moreover, “while awaiting specific diagnoses, patients often receive overly broad antibiotics that can contribute to antibiotic resistance. Scientists in the UK have developed a new and improved diagnostic tool to avoid this problem. They have built a DNA sequencing program that diagnoses infections much more accurately and delivers results within 48 hours by reading the bacteria’s genetic code.”
As The Guardian explains, scientists in London
designed a DNA sequencing program to diagnose bacterial infections much faster and more accurately.
DNA sequencing involves reading the genetic code of bacteria. Experts say it is akin to reading the instruction manual that tells bacteria how to function.
It enables scientists to identify the specific type of bacteria and which antibiotics it might be resistant to, helping doctors give the patient the most effective treatment, instead of broad-spectrum antibiotics.
The pioneering system, successfully trialled in 2,000 NHS patients, is already helping doctors offer better-targeted treatments earlier. This means a much quicker recovery, fewer complications such as sepsis, and a lower risk of others picking up the infection and of superbugs emerging in wards.
A virus is being used to cure deafness in new gene therapy. Researchers also discovered that a plant virus could be used to save crops from root-eating pests.
Scientists have engineered a virus to steal proteins from the HIV virus, in hopes of eliminating AIDS.
In other good news, the African nation of Guinea recently eradicated sleeping sickness, a parasitic disease carried by the tsetse fly that causes irreversible brain damage and then death, if left untreated (sleeping sickness also leads to disrupted sleeping patterns, aggressiveness, psychosis, and bizarre behavior).
Niger recently became the first nation in Africa to eliminate river blindness, a disease spread by flies that breed near rivers. Those flies carry long thin parasitic worms that burrow in the sufferer’s skin.
