Before explaining my issue, I’d like to point out the fact that english is neither my native language nor is it the language of studies in my country. So I hope I’ll be making myself clear.
It’s always possible for the bacteria to develop resistance for a certain kind of antibiotic, so finishing your antibiotic or not seems irrelevant once the mutation appears because the new bacterial strain will have the possibility to multiply and so on …
so is the good use of antibiotics only slowing down the pace of the superbugs rise ?Thank you in advance.
In: 4
All the bacteria in your body need to die for you to be healed. Taking antibiotics only kills a few with each dose you take. Say you have 100 bacteria in your body, and only one of them is a superbug that is very resistent to the antibiotic. Day 1 you kill 20 bacteria, the 20 weakest ones. Day 2 you kill 20 more, slightly less weak. Day 3 you kill 20 more, even less weak. Day 4 you kill another 20. By now you’ve killed 80/100 bacteria so you feel a bit better. If you skip the last dose, you still have 20 bacteria in your body, and among them the superbug which survived until now. It now has plenty of room to grow and make more superbugs, as it’s not competing with the 80 bacteria you killed anymore. So you’re very likely to get a second, much worse illness, because you now have an infection with a version of the bacteria that is more resistant. You couldn’t treat it with the same antibiotic since that superbug is resistent to that antibiotic.
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