Staying Healthy
You can protect yourself against superbugs
Although the Zika virus got more publicity throughout the summer, another—and even scarier-sounding—microbe also made headlines. Dubbed a new "superbug," strains of E. coli resistant to the antibiotic colistin were found in the United States. Colistin is a drug often used when others fail to control a bacterial infection. Fortunately, the bacteria weren't resistant to other antibiotics, which cleared the infections. "Although this particular case of antibiotic resistance may not be as dire as the media made it sound, in general these increasingly high-level resistances are an enormous problem," says Dr. Sarah Fortune, professor of immunology and infectious diseases at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
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