Ordinary infection
Recently, Chief Medical Officer of the UK, Dame Sally Davies, sketched an apocalyptic scenario: “If we don't act now, any one of us could go into hospital in 20 years for minor surgery and die because of an ordinary infection.” Simply because the world has run out of antibiotics.

Novel antibiotics
Davies is just one of the many urging coordinated international action to tackle this global threat. One of the ways to fight back is to develop new antibiotics that are able to kill multi-drug-resistant bacteria.

Acute problem
The problem is very acute, confirms Microbiologist Dr John P. Hays. “In two decades, society may return to the pre-antibiotic era.” Dr Hays is Scientific Coordinator of NABARSI, a new research project to identify and develop novel antibiotics. This can be achieved through inhibition of enzymes present in many types of bacteria. As a result, the new antibiotics will work against a broad range of bacteria.
Dr Hays: “The NABARSI project has the potential to develop urgently needed antibiotics to treat multi-drug antibiotic-resistant microorganisms.”

Rapid tests
Dr Hays is also Coordinator of a related EU-funded research project called TEMPOtest-QC. This project aims to limit antibiotic resistance by improving diagnosis, which is of vital importance to public health. “We create collections of bacterial isolates and evaluate new technologies. We also collect the views of the general public and medical professionals about obstacles and benefits to the implementation of rapid diagnostic tests”.