David Peat

Re-envisioning the Planet 177about them? It is only relatively recently that the medical professionhas become concerned with the indiscriminate way antibiotics havebeen used, and fear that yet again humans have been too enthusiasticin putting all their eggs in one basket. 4As with any form of life, disease-producing organisms are not allgenetically identical. While an antibiotic will wipe out most of a populationof bacteria, a few hardier strains may survive. As time goes on,these bacteria begin to multiply to the point where a new drug-resistantstrain dominates. This evolution of drug-resistant strains is alsoencouraged by those who never bother to take their full course of treatment—assoon as they feel a little better they throw away the bottle.Drug-resistant diseases are also prevalent among drug addicts andstreet people whose lifestyle leaves them open to a large number ofopportunistic infections and who, in turn, do not seek proper treatment.At this point, chemists race to develop a variant of the antibioticthat is lethal to the new resistant strain. But the war between scienceand microorganisms cannot continue indefinitely. Already tuberculosis,a disease that had more or less been eradicated from the industrialworld, is reappearing in a strongly drug-resistant form. Ironically hospitalsthemselves, which once relied on the widespread use of antibiotics,have become potentially hazardous places in which to be ill. Statisticsfrom Europe suggest, for example, that in normal pregnancies it issafer to give birth at home than in a hospital environment.Of Mice and MenDespite our inventiveness and the sum total of our scientific knowledge,the control we assumed we had over the world around us, andour ability to plan for and anticipate events is less secure than we sus-4Doctors even prescribe antibiotics for viral infections while knowing perfectlywell that antibiotics have no effect on viruses! If criticized they would probably arguethat they are concerned about opportunistic secondary infections, yet would have toadmit that they have no evidence that their patient actually has such secondary infections—itwould be “just a precaution.”