Context: Scientists are considering the therapeutic use of bacteriophages to kill bacteria, as an alternative to Antibiotics. Pharmaceutical companies are losing interest in developing new antibiotics due to increasing Antimicrobial Resistance.
Relevance of the Topic: Prelims: Key facts about Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR); Bacteriophages.
What is Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)?
- Resistance acquired by any microorganism (bacteria, viruses, fungi, parasite, etc.) against antimicrobial drugs (such as antibiotics, antifungals, antivirals, antimalarials) that are used to treat infections.
- Microorganisms that develop AMR are referred to as superbugs. Due to AMR, standard treatments become ineffective, infections persist and may spread to others.
- WHO has identified AMR as one of the top threats to public health. Estimated 5 million deaths globally are related to AMR every year. This is expected to double by 2050.
Largely, pharmaceutical companies have lost interest in developing new antibiotics. Scientists are considering the use of Bacteriophages as an alternative (or complementary) to Antibiotics.
About Bacteriophages
- Bacteriophages are ‘good viruses’ that naturally prey on bacteria.
- They are ubiquitous, i.e., present in the water, in the soil, in our gut, on skin, etc.
- There are believed to be 10-times as many phages as bacteria on the earth.
Therapeutic uses of Bacteriophages:
Phages have been used for burns, foot ulcers, gut infections, respiratory infections, urinary tract infections, etc. There are two main strategies that have been used.
- Natural Phage Therapy: Bacteria are isolated from the infected tissue. Labs identify which phage works against the particular bacteria. The selected phage (from phage bank) is cultured and administered into the patient.
- Genetically engineered phages: Modified in the lab to target a broader range of bacterial strains.
Challenges in therapeutic uses of Bacteriophages:
- Narrow Range: Unlike an antibiotic, which may be able to kill many species of bacteria, phages may only kill a few strains of a particular bacterium. This is because phages are very specific to bacteria. So, it is challenging to conduct randomised controlled trials when the drug needed for each patient may be different.
- Regulatory Issues: Bacteria can evolve to be resistant to a phage. However, the phages can also evolve to avoid the bacterial resistance. The drug is not a constant but an evolving entity. This poses problems in regulatory clearance.
Researchers are currently working to create a device in which all of the following steps can be conducted: isolate the bacteria from an infection, sequence its genome, use AI to determine which phage genome is the most likely to work, create the phage from scratch in the device, and administer it to the patient on the spot.