– I have never seen anything like it in Europe. We expected to find multi-resistant bacteria, but not that it would be that bad.
That’s what Kristian Riesbeck, professor of clinical bacteriology at Lund University in Sweden, says TV4.
Together with his colleagues at the university, and researchers at the Eucast laboratory in Växjö and in Ukraine, they have examined antibiotic-resistant bacteria from patients in Ukrainian hospitals.
He describes the findings as “scary”.
– Gets very, very bloody
Antibiotic resistance means that bacteria can continue to live and multiply even if they are exposed to antibiotics. Bacteria that are resistant to two or more antibiotics are called multi-resistant FHI.
SCARY: 3D illustration of multidrug-resistant bacteria. Photo: Shutterstock/NTB Show more
The hospitals in Ukraine are overloaded with injured soldiers and Riesback and his colleagues have taken samples from 131 adults with war injuries, and from eight newborn children with pneumonia.
The findings show that several of the bacteria they found were multi-resistant, and six percent of the bacteria were resistant to all the antibiotics tested.
– If the bacteria enter the bloodstream and cause sepsis, it can be a death sentence because there are no antibiotics to treat it, says Riesbeck.
– Worse every hour
They also found that around ten percent of the bacteria were resistant to Colistin, which is an antibiotic used as a last resort if nothing else works.
Riesbeck says that the patients were not infected before they were admitted, but that it happened when they were treated for their injuries. It is allegedly happening because the Ukrainian hospitals are so overloaded.
It makes it difficult to isolate infected patients or close wards if they get dangerous bacteria in, says Riesbeck, who felt sorry for the doctors in Ukraine.
2023-07-03 01:01:50
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