E. coli more resistant to antibiotics, study says

Dr. James Johnson of the Minneapolis VA Medical Center has bad news for people with urinary tract infections: There's a growing chance that antibiotics might be useless in treating them before long.

Experts have been warning for years that many germs are becoming drug-resistant, thanks to overuse of antibiotics in people and animals. Now, in a study coming out Sunday, Johnson reports a growing number of E. coli infections are immune to the most commonly used antibiotics.

That's a big concern, he said, because it may not be long before the germ can outwit every antibiotic in the medical arsenal.

THE BACK STORY

E. coli is best known as a foodborne germ that can cause stomachaches and diarrhea. But it is also to blame for millions of bladder infections every year, as well as tens of thousands of potentially deadly bloodstream infections in hospital patients, Johnson said.

WHAT'S NEW?

Johnson, an infectious disease expert at the VA hospital and the University of Minnesota, and his colleagues studied E. coli infections from around the country in 2007. They found that 17 percent were caused by one strain -- a strain that is resistant to the most commonly used antibiotics. This strain was rarely seen 10 years ago, Johnson said.

For one thing, it means doctors might be giving patients drugs that don't work. "A lot of people now are finding that their infection cannot be readily treated," he said. "They tend to stay in hospital longer [or] don't get well."

WHERE DO THESE GERMS COME FROM?

They're all around us and are even inside our digestive systems. Most of the time they're harmless bystanders -- unless they get into the bloodstream or someplace else, such as the urinary tract, where they don't belong.

CAN ANY DRUG KILL THIS STRAIN?

Yes, for now.

The big concern is that this strain will develop resistance to those drugs as well, and there's nothing in the pipeline to replace them.

WHAT'S THE SOLUTION?

More research on new antibiotics and a more cautious approach to antibiotic use, experts say.

"It really is becoming a major public health threat because the bugs are getting ahead of us," said Dr. Ruth Lynfield, Minnesota's state epidemiologist.

The study appears in the Aug. 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases.