These are the words of Lisa, who has resistant bacteria continually collecting around surgical devices in her body which cause dreadful infection and make her feel really unwell. She has also experienced severe pneumonia on several occasions.
She told our Patient Support Officer, Arlene, that “We need to use coronavirus to our advantage, and we need to learn lessons from it. We have no new antibiotics in the pipeline being developed. We desperately need more new antibiotics for the future. And we need to develop them now – before the antibiotic crisis is upon us! There are so many parallels to be drawn between the coronavirus outbreak and the antibiotic resistance global problem we all find ourselves in – whether we realise it or not. We don’t want to have to “cross our fingers” or find ourselves in lockdown again – but this time, because there’s a bacterial infection spreading globally for which we don’t have any new antibiotics!”
She went on to say:
“Just a simple thing liking washing hands can make a massive difference in our health and immunity. Hand washing helps keep us safe from unwanted bacteria or viruses spreading. People need to remember that a normally healthy person might be a little bit ill without presenting any symptoms. But, they could still pass it on to someone in the “at risk” group. This could cause them to become extremely ill or even die because of their underlying conditions. The worrying element is, you might not even know you have passed it on till it’s too late.”
“And in the same way, we need to be in this together to highlight the danger of antibiotic resistance – which one day will present even worse problems – unless we act now to develop new antibiotics!”
Get support
You can reach Arlene, our Patient Support Officer by emailing patient.support@antibioticresearch.org.uk or by texting or calling the confidential patient support number 07367 784114.
Don’t forget that Arlene is supported entirely by funds provided by our charity. Please help Arlene help others by making a DONATION and support the prevention of a global antibiotic crisis.