How Do We Fix Antibiotics?
How Komodo dragons, three toed sloths, and Dutch pigs could help avert a post-antibiotics apocalypse.
By 2050, experts predict that drug-resistant infections will kill one person every three seconds unless the world’s governments take drastic steps now. But given the complexity of antibiotics resistance, what should their plan be? Some of the possible fixes involve changing ingrained human behaviours such as doctors’ prescribing habits and the intensive farming of animals. But other promising solutions to avert a post-antibiotics apocalypse come from surprising sources. Scientists are now hunting for undiscovered fungi in the world’s most remote places while other researchers stay in the lab deciphering the language of bacteria.
(Photo: A depiction of some EHEC bacteria Credit: HZI/Getty Images)
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Stop bacteria chatting
Duration: 01:44
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Antibiotics hunters
Duration: 01:56
Broadcasts
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 01:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Americas and the Caribbean
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 02:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Online & UK DAB/Freeview only
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 03:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service East Asia
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 04:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Australasia & South Asia only
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 06:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service East and Southern Africa
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 14:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service except News Internet
- Tue 25 Oct 2016 21:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service except East and Southern Africa & News Internet
- Sun 30 Oct 2016 02:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Australasia & South Asia only
- Sun 30 Oct 2016 04:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Americas and the Caribbean, East Asia, East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa only
- Sun 30 Oct 2016 05:06GMT91Èȱ¬ World Service Online, Europe and the Middle East & UK DAB/Freeview only
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