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How to beat superbugs
May 23, 2002HOSPITALS in Britain will next week begin testing a drug against superbugs that mimics the antibodies produced by our immune systems.
With superbugs fast developing resistance to every antibiotic we can throw at them, alternative treatments are urgently needed. In 1990, 2 per cent of Staphylococcus aureus infections in hospital patients were methicillin resistant-the so-called MRSA strains. Today, the figure is nearer a third and vancomycin, the only drug that can still kill MRSA, is showing chinks in its armour. The spectre of superbugs that resist vancomycin really frightens people, says James Burnie of the University of Manchester.
Instead of testing various chemicals in the hope of finding one that will kill the superbugs, Burnie and his team isolated an antibody from a patient who survived an MRSA infection. The antibody binds to and blocks the superbug`s version of the ABC transporter, a protein that moves substances such as ions and proteins into and out of bacterial cells.
The team worked out the DNA sequence for the key part of the antibody and engineered this into E. coli bacteria. Normally, the big problem with getting bacteria to produce human antibodies is that they don`t fold properly and so are useless. But Burnie says they have developed a way of refolding the antibody correctly after it`s been purified, though he won`t reveal the details.
Lab tests have shown that the antibody treatment, dubbed Aurograb, greatly reduces the growth of MRSA strains and those resistant to vancomycin, Burnie told the American Society for Microbiology meeting in Salt Lake City this week. Hospital trials are about to begin. If Aurograb is a success, the challenge will be to prevent superbugs developing resistance to it as well. Burnie thinks the drug should be given in combination with others, such as vancomycin.
Author: James Randerson
New Scientist
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