Moosh:] wrote:
On 21 Jul 2003 11:53:41 GMT, Brian Sandle
wrote:

In sci.med.nutrition Gordon Couger wrote:

"Brian Sandle" wrote in message
...

Not anthropomorphism, ecology of genes. The chief of the University of
Canterbury Plant and Microbial Sciences Department runs the New Zealand
Gene Ecology organisation. (Jack Heinemann) (do google search in
www.canterbury.ac.nz)

Because bacteria can exchange genes to their advantage in the protected
environment of a human cell it is necessary to take more care with drug
resistance genes. We should not be feeding drug resistance genes to people
en masse, not checking up with control groups if it is triggering
anything.

As bacteria make better bacteria we have to make better drugs.

However in this case we are doing the opposite. We are giving the bacteria
the genes to improve their resistance.

You reckon they haven't already tried these somewhere over the past
aeons? Afterall where did these "resistance markers" come from?

Probably from culturing them in a weak antibiotic environment, then
gradually stronger when you find ones which learn to survive.

Yes this may be important in the short term, but in the grand scheme
of things, it's only a matter of time before these bacteria would have
developed resistance to all antibiotics known today.

When the resistance is of no use to them then the gene to express it will
not be expressing. That is when there is no antibiotic being applied
for a while. But put the genes in everyone's food and they are
always there.


The same is
true with insects on the farm. 75 years ago simple natural pesticides work
for my father. In the 50's and 60's the first generation of insecticides
work very very well. We have had to keep making better insecticides and at
the same time more specific ones.

But as Jim admitted there is no drug that could cure his father's MRSA
(methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus).

I suspect there was, but his father was unable to take it.

Something like vancomycin? I have read someone suggesting using it for
prevention when they do operations. So resistance to it by Staph. aureus
will probably be developing, too. Yes it is a bit toxic - maybe hearing
damage to quite a few.

There is always a drug which can kill the illness, but may quite often
kill the patient, agreed.

It had to be left to nature
to take its course with some nursing care (soap and water and bandages).

We also learned how to extend their
usefulness but

he means `by' not `but'.

refuges and IPM.

When you plant bt corn or cotton you plant it in a checkerboard pattern
with non-bt so some of the bugs will develop in non-bt and the development
of resistance will be slowed a bit. Still there will be loss of
effectiveness of organic bt
to the organic farmers who only apply it when necessary, and have it
active for a short period. With that use resistance does not develop.
With the bt crops teh bt is there all the time and gradually weakens as
the crop ages - perfect for development of resistance.

It always amazes me how Organic folk can accept a GE "chemical" as OK
for their needs.

Bt is a natural soil bacterium, Bacillus thuringiensis, which happens to
be toxic to butterfly and moth larvae. It is not a GE "chemical", though
the genes producing the Bt toxins have been engineered into GE crops.

Desperation? Anyways, Bt has been so overused that it
only has a limited useful life.

Now that it is present perpetually, whether really needed or not, you are
right.

New specific pesticides will be
developed.

Which we do not know the problems with. And the produce will probably not
sell as well as when the organic Bt stuff was used occasionally.

If you want to blame some one for antibiotic resistant bacteria the water
out of the sewer plant has several orders of magnitude more effect that
crops possibly could because they are mixed with the pathogens at the sewer
and in the environment and give them a chance to build resistance.

Sewage is not being eaten by everyone.

But it's where epidemics start.

Epidemics start when the bugs are resistant to the conditions in the host.
They continue when drugs given to the host are resisted by the bugs, too.
When everyone is eating food with the resistance in it that is far more
likely.

Also it will be worse with
incompletely digested naked DNA from GM crops.

I don't see why. Why should a gut commensal suddenly become pathogenic
at the same time it absorbs a million-to-one chance of a compatible
antibiotic resistant gene?

Bacterial resistance tends to be multidrug resistant.

Poor food hygiene introduces the bacteria from a worker who has not washed
themselves or animal faecal contamination. An infected beast or human is
treated with antibiotics and the bacteria has ducked inside a huamn cell
and exchanges drug resistance from naked DNA which has got there since
everyone has it in their diet. Lots in the population have less than
optimal digestion, leaky guts from gluten injury, and will get the naked
DNA into their circulation.

Seems very far-fetched to me. Of course
there will likely be plenty of other antibiotics to treat this rare
event, if that is what is needed.

Another class of antibiotics may have deleterious side effects - hearing
damage, kidney damage, liver damage. Some 3 to 14% of hospital admissions
result from prescribed drug injury.