Funding for antibacterial resistance research. Not so much.

At least no funding for ESCKAPE pathogen research

I just got back from attending the World HAI Forum in Annecy and the 1st ICPIC meeting in Geneva.  Both great meetings.  I will share my thoughts on the implications of ICPIC in a later post.

Last year at IDSA, Roy (Trip) Gulick stated that there are now 10,000 possible ART combinations for HIV treatment.  When he said that, I instantly got a sinking feeling in my gut.  Right now, there are many people colonized and infected with resistant bacteria for which we have NO EFFECTIVE THERAPY.  Sorry for shouting.  Think about the MDR-Acinetobacter or NDM-1 strains that are circulating.  Pretty soon we won't even have effective therapy for community UTIs.  

As I thought about why this might be, I looked for the federal funding picture for antibacterial resistance research, but there were no published data.  So, we found the numbers ourselves.  I presented the data last week and Marin McKenna kindly described our findings at the World HAI Forum on her Wired Superbug blog.  She did a much better job describing our research findings than I could have.  If you're interested in reading about how much NIH/NIAID spends on antibacterial resistance research, head on over to her blog...

SUPERBUG - now in paperback

We've posted several times (here and here) on Maryn McKenna's homage to MRSA.  Head on over to Maryn's Wired Science Superbug blog to hear more about the book.  It's too bad that there is a new C. difficile PCR out. Now the world is conspiring to turn C. diff into the new superbug leaving poor old MRSA in the dust.  I have a sneaking feeling that MRSA doesn't read the news though, so I would imagine that it won't change its behavior too much.

Maryn McKenna visits Iowa City (and 1957 Cleveland)

McKenna's latest book

We've written before about Maryn McKenna, who is the author of Superbug, a journalist and a blogger.  After PepsiGate tore through ScienceBlogs, she had to relocate her blog to here and finally here, so I wanted to make sure you all could still find her.  She writes extensively about antibiotic resistance and other infectious diseases at Wired - she knows her science, which is rare among journalists, and she's a wonderful storyteller too.  Check out her latest post on the pre-publication NDM-1 EID papers.

Maryn was on the UI campus today and spoke at a UI College of Public Health conference on MRSA; she gave a wonderful history of resistant Staphylococcus aureus and MRSA. She even mentioned in passing the important conference in Cleveland on November 14, 1957.

Do you know that conference?  This conference was sponsored by 15 organizations including the AMA with ACP, ACS, AHA, ACOG, AAP, VA, CDC, USPHS, FDA and APHA among others. The presentations and discussions at this conference led to the development of a national program for the eradication of S. aureus in hospitals and to the following recommendations for the AMA trustees:

1. That every hospital establish a responsible officer or committee charged with the investigation and control of infections within that hospital and with the institution of procedures and practices designed to prevent such infections.

2. That encouragement and funds be channeled into scientific research concerning the etiology and epidemiology and the immune relationships of pyogenic staphylococci, their relationships to the defensive cells of the body and the mechanism of their mutability to drug and antibiotic resistance.

The AMA trustees approved this within one month and referred it to the Joint Commission, which in the spring of 1958 added #1 above to the requirements for hospitals seeking accreditation. Thus we have these people, groups and S. aureus to thank for infection control programs as we know them today. I wonder if we need a similar conference now on MDR-Gram negatives?

Reference: Wise RI, et al. Reviews of Infect Dis, Nov-Dec 1989

Question: Why was the conference in Cleveland?

Perhaps because Charles Henry Rammelkamp, Jr., M.D was there. He was well known for his work demonstrating the impact of a sulfonamide derivatives on staphylococci and reporting the first penicillin-resistant strain of staphylococcus. He also contributed to the understanding of the epidemiology of staphylococci in nurseries and the role of coagulase in the evolution of staphylococcal disease.  Not sure if that's why, but seems like a good enough reason to me.

Good move Maryn McKenna

We have written often on conflicts of interest. So, I've been following the recent "problems" over at ScienceBlogs.com closely. Quick story is that 2 weeks ago the editors there added a Food Frontiers blog completely funded and written by PepsiCo. I think internist PalMD said it best:

"It could be argued that since it is clearly announced that the content is PepsiCo's, that transparency is maintained, but it's not. Readers of the other 70-odd blogs at Sb expect independent content in the center column. What's more, Sb is indexed by Google News. As a news outlet, we should be held to a high standard. If the SEED management can't see what's wrong with this, this may be an insoluble problem."

PalMD left and returned to his old site as did Maryn McKenna. Many other great bloggers have left too. It must have been a difficult decision to leave the collective, but it is a good one.

PalMD's White Coat Underground (link) and PalMD's full comments (here)
McKenna's Superbug blog (link)
The Guardian's take (here)
Our COI posts (here)