There seems to be no good reason to explain why we use antibiotics rather than bacteriophage therapy in order to treat bacterial infections. Further, given the strains of antibiotic resistant bacteria that are contaminating hospitals and other areas, it isn’t clear why this therapy is not already being used in what is a very dangerous situation. An article by Burrowes and colleagues (2011) provides considerable detail on this old treatment which is being given new consideration as a treatment therapy.
It is a surprise to discover that antibiotics have only a short history. It seems to be a standard and normal thing to look for antibacterial products or to ask for antibiotics when sick, and yet a completely different approach has been used for far longer, one which might have better long term impacts. The article states that bacteriophages have been around for billions of years and this is a startling contrast to the use of antibiotics in modern medicine (Burrowes et al, 2011). A further issue is that fact that using antibiotics have caused so many problems in this very short period of time. If antibiotics had been used as often and for as long as bacteriophage therapy what sort of bacterial super-monsters might have been created?
I would have some concerns before I felt comfortable with the use of bacteriophage therapy for a member of my family. For example, one of the reasons given for why antibiotics had risen up and become so popular is that they have low toxicity in production. This makes me wonder about the potential for toxicity in the phage therapy.
One of the concerns cited in the article is the difficulty in determining precisely which bacteria are causing an infection, and this is also a surprise. In a day and age where DNA analysis can determine ancestry and the epidemiology of various disease factors how can it be that simple tests are not available to determine specific strains of bacteria? Further, given the concept of the bacteriophage “cocktail”, it is a simple leap to assume that the standard antibiotics which are given out when there is a bacterial infection causing a medical problem are just another form of cocktail, since it can’t really be known what is causing the infection. Clearly microbiology is far behind in terms of the population’s expectations of what we know, or should know, about bacteria and bacterial infections.
The drawbacks to the use of bacteriophage therapy seem fairly narrow, rare and avoidable. While there are some that cause toxic cellular byproducts, the simple response is not to use those bacteriophages in therapies. Another consideration is the fact that many need cold storage, but so many medications already need cold storage and this has not caused significant problems. There is however one aspect that seems a bit… unpleasant. The phages which were used in some of the research which is described in Burrowes and colleagues article describes isolating the phages from sewage. This may be a deal breaker for many people, who might simply be fearful of anything that comes from sewage, even if it is medicine.
The last thought for reflection is the extent to which these bacteriophages are already at work in our everyday lives. This might be particularly true in area where development has not yet reached the same level of modernization as in the West. Is it possible that many of the diseases which seem to particularly strike the modern world are at the cause of a lack of the natural work of bacteriophages? While we discuss the use of bacteriophages in medical treatments, is it not possible that the cause for concern is that we are missing a key alliance that has been part of our natural regiments and improving our health for generations, centuries and perhaps even Millennia? It is worth thinking about.
