The scientific revolution created a great foundation to a brilliant structure of discovery. It lead to the medical revolution, which enabled doctors and researchers to make, leaps into the elimination of diseases such as polio. Indeed, we have made enormous strides in the past century in our understandings of our enemies that we can’t see. Sometimes we have to make strange decisions in order to find the information, which we need to understand and combat a virus or bacteria. Today, health experts in Cornwall have teamed up with the local surfing community to combat super bugs. Lately, there have been more than 400 pollution warnings at their local beaches. However, that’s not enough to stop some of the local surfers. Scientists have arranged to swab the rectums of the local surfers to try and find prime samples of bacteria, possibly even super bugs.
The rise of super bugs has been a direct result of our antibiotics, which we use to combat common bacterial infections and illnesses. They are bacteria and viruses, which have grown immunity to the antibiotics that are developed and prescribed to fight the original virus or bacteria. The recent spring of super bugs has threatened our previous security that we found in the development of antibiotics. In today’s society, people generally do not fear bacterial born illnesses as we did before. The irony is clear. The medicines that made us feel invincible to illnesses may actually lead to new unstoppable illnesses. It is still debated whether or not the development of products such as antibacterial soaps will actually lead to unstoppable diseases. However, it is clear that bacteria are evolving and becoming more tolerant to antibiotics and this will clearly be a focus point for our generation as well as the future generations.
So, although it may seem a bit strange to approach the surfing community with rectal swabs, the medical professionals of Cornwall have a virtuous purpose and a war on bacteria to fight. The swabs will give researchers an insight into the microbes that are colonizing participant’s innards and they are hoping that by comparing samples from those who regularly spend time in seawater with those who don’t, they’ll be able to build a clearer picture of how antibiotic resistance in the environment can affect people. With our abilities to fight off bacteria with modern medicine diminishing, we will find ourselves fighting an upward battle. Perhaps, our generation will need to accept that our bodies are designed by evolution to fight off bacteria and develop our own immunities to them. The strange prediction though, is that our bodies will be fighting ‘Hulk’ like viruses and bacteria that are completely unstoppable. Only time will tell if this prediction will be true. In the past, we have seen illnesses like the black plague wipe out almost entire civilizations so maybe the prediction of super bugs isn’t that crazy. If an illness like the black plague were to come back with an ability to resist all treatments then what would stop it from destroying the human race? This fear hopefully will not be justified.