Eli5 why not finishing a full course of antibiotics causes resistant strains of bacteria

1.12K views

My understanding is that the antibiotics won’t kill the random mutant bacteria anyway, so doesn’t killing off all the susceptible ones just allow for more room for the mutants?

Does it have to do with more base bacteria getting the chance to mutate? A specific resistance has to be pretty rare right? Or will you have multiples of the same mutation in a “colony”?

In: Biology

6 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Just like in any population of people, some bugs are tougher than others
If you don’t finish the course of antibiotics, you may leave a few bugs behind , albeit in a weakened state.
Those bugs recover and are effectively immunized against the antibiotic and then they start to multiply again and their offspring are immune to the medication

You are viewing 1 out of 6 answers, click here to view all answers.