Two more ways microbiology is going to kill you

Well, I say two “more”, but in fact we’ve covered one of these on more than one occasion previously. That’s the issue of antibiotic resistance and the fact that we’re all – at some point or other – going to die a horrible infected death.

But we won’t be the first. Not by a long shot. Because The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the US revealed (just before the Federal Shutdown) that of the 2 million plus Americans affected by antibiotic resistant bugs each year, around 23,000 will die. This is news because it’s the first time they’ve put a hard number on the number of deaths. And they’ve done it as objectively as possible:

The number of deaths is substantially lower than previous estimates, in part because researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stripped out cases in which a drug-resistant infection was present but not necessarily the cause of death.

Which isn’t great, but does at least set down the ground rules – and therefore a baseline – for future calculations. Those future calculations are unlikely to be pretty:

“We are getting closer and closer to the cliff,” said Dr. Michael Bell, a CDC official who presented the data.

Yes, we know. Sally already told you that.

However, should you currently be in Madagascar (and especially in its prisons), antibiotic resistance is probably not going to worry you.
BUT THE BUBONIC PLAGUE MIGHT.

Yes, really.

Also known as The Black Death, this is exactly the same disease the swept through Europe in the 17th Century, killing about half the population of the continent. I remember a scare back in the lab in Oxford in the late 90s when one of our ID tests gave a result that could have indicated Y.pestis (the bug that cause bubonic plague) and everyone crapped themselves.
Fortunately, it turned out not to be the case and anyway, crapping oneself is not a symptom.

But now experts have warned that Madagascar is on the point of a major epidemic unless it slows the spread of the disease:

The Red Cross and Pasteur Institute say inmates in the island’s dirty, crowded jails are particularly at risk. The number of cases rises each October as hot humid weather attracts fleas, which transmit the disease from rats and other animals to humans. Madagascar had 256 plague cases and 60 deaths last year, the world’s highest recorded number.

Because this is a bacterial disease, it can easily be treated with antibiotics – and fortunately there are very few resistance problems in this case. For the moment at least.

The major issues with getting people treated are socioeconomic ones:

a lack of facilities and traditional shame over the disease made this tricky in outlying parts of Madagascar

Look, I’m not saying “don’t go to Madagascar”. It’s got a lot to offer: lemurs… and… stuff. But if you do go to Madagacar, it’s probably best to not end up in one of their prisons.

I’m sure you knew this already. I’m just saying that right now, it could be even worse than you expected.

When microbiology makes the news

Not just any microbiology news – Naegleria fowleri microbiology news.

Not heard of Naegleria fowleri? Not under its technical name* perhaps, but you will probably recognise its alter ego:

bea

Yes. Naegleria fowleri is the BRAIN-EATING AMOEBA! It’s an amoeba… that eats your brain.
And it’s catchy (the bug, not the name):

bea2

Fascinating. Naegleria doesn’t discriminate. Next it’ll be infecting black people and white people and everything. (You’ve been warned.)

But N.fowleri is behind the times with its gastronomical preferences. Streptococcus pyogenes was making headlines long ago. Don’t recall it? How about if I told you that it was actually called THE DEADLY FLESH EATING BUG?
And – kerching, light bulb moment – suddenly you know.
But did you know that you can save yourself from certain death by being obese? Yes, really.

Then there are our Extended Spectrum Beta-Lactamase Producers and Vancomycin Resistant Enterococci. Too technical again?
These are the “proper terms” for SUPERBUGS that are going to kill us all.

I always smirk when I read these sort of descriptions and headlines, but there is an important point here: putting things into layman’s terms raises awareness. It makes them accessible to the common person. (There is perhaps a case to be made for maybe dumbing them down and sentionalising them a little less though.)

Ain’t nobody going to read an article on Sky News entitled “Patient with Naegleria fowleri cerebral infection remains capable of conversation”.
But stick in a bit of brain-eating and suddenly everyone’s a fan.

Viva microbiology! Viva!

* or its ‘name’ as we microbiologists refer to it. 

Glass bugs

Ah. Microbiology. Dontcha just love it?

Yeah – me too. And so does artist Luke Jerram – he’s made some amazing glass sculptures of protozoa, bacteria and viruses:

Made to contemplate the global impact of each disease, the artworks were created as alternative representations of viruses to the artificially coloured imagery we receive through the media. In fact, viruses have no colour as they are smaller than the wavelength of light. By extracting the colour from the imagery and creating jewel like beautiful sculptures in glass, a complex tension has arisen between the artworks’ beauty and what they represent.

Personally, I couldn’t see the “complex tension” – that sounds a bit unnecessarily arty-farty to me. But they are pretty special to look at:

T4Phage-Phage_artwork

Ecoli_sculptureThat’s a T4 Bacteriophage at the top, and my old friend E.coli on the bottom – check out those flagellae – hello big boy! But of course, they’re (thankfully) not actual size. The real things are far smaller then this, hence “micro”biology. I know you knew that.

There are a whole lot more images to look at on Luke’s website too: SARS, HIV, Smallpox, Malaria etc etc.

The beautifully detailed collection has now been bought for permanent exhibition at the The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Baltic Belly

Yay! Microbiology makes the headlines again. For all the right reasons. Sort of.

Numerous reports across the media this morning on this paper which appears to indicate that Vibrio spp. gastrointestinal infections are on the rise in the Baltic states due to climate change and the rising temperature of that sea.
Vibrio is the genus that causes cholera and other nasty bowel disturbances. It’s nothing new, even in temperate climes, but it’s generally more associated with warmer areas, especially – as I recall from my days in the Oxford lab – the entirety of South East Asia. Holidaymakers generally brought more than just memories and a ceramic elephant back from Thailand.

Some Vibrio yesterday (they’re not actually this big though)

It seems that for every degree that the Baltic sea temperature increases, the number of Vibrio cases rises by almost 200%. Not much of an issue there to be honest, because we’re starting from a very low baseline, but since the Baltic “represents, to our knowledge, the fastest warming marine ecosystem examined so far anywhere on Earth” and appears to be getting about 6-7 degrees warmer each century, it may serve as a decent model for other infections and geographical locations.

Changing patterns of infection due to the local environment is nothing new. Malaria was once present across Europe and North America, yet we only see imported cases these days. (That said, I once contracted malaria in London, but that was in a lab at Imperial College.) (Don’t try this at home.)

Anyway, even if you are travelling to Poland, Lithuania, Estonia or Latvia, don’t panic too much. The likelihood of you getting cholera is very, very small. Although, if the photo above is anything to go by, you may want to avoid the local sausages just to make sure.