New Yorkers Lead Way in Warning About Superbugs

Americans’ treatment of our bodies often reminds me of investment schemes. Risks, manipulations, and false rewards, so obvious in the wake of the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the exposure of Bernie Madoff, raised few eyebrows beforehand. Yet there were whistleblowers, and warning signs.

That’s why the work of Dr. Martin Blaser is so important, and why public health leaders and policy-makers are paying attention to his new book Missing Microbes. Dr. Blaser, who heads the Human Microbiome Program at NYU, is asking questions about the overuse of antibiotics that echo far beyond the ranks of clinicians.

As he showed this month in his in-depth interview on “Fresh Air” with Terry Gross, Blaser is making overdue connections between the glut of medications in humans and our food sources and the spread of deadly infections. No one can afford to look away.

In Blaser’s interview, like his book, he educates on a big stage. He describes the epidemic of Clostridium difficile, or C. diff. that kills 1 American every 19 minutes, more than 28,000 every year. My mother, a healthy 56-year-old Brooklyn school teacher, died from a C. diff. infection four years ago this month.

Blaser calls on farmers and veterinarians to stop over-medicating chickens, cows, and other livestock. Among humans, Blaser urges physicians, pregnant women, and parents to stop over-medication, especially in young children.
Warnings prompt action when they are specific. Blaser doesn’t shy away from facts and prescriptions that indicate exactly how doctors, lawmakers, and ordinary Americans can stop and prevent suffering. Here are three of them:

Symptoms recognition: With more time to interact with patients, doctors could pay closer attention to specific signs of illness. For C. diff., which manifests with painful diarrhea and bloating, accurate and early identification of the disease is crucial, since it can often be mistaken for flu. My own mother died from C. diff. after less than a week of intensifying sickness. Increasing awareness of C. diff. among healthcare workers needs to translate into quicker detection of symptoms.

Narrowly tailored antibiotics, targeting specific bacteria: Blaser shows a grasp on the research and developmental process by urging creation of bacteria-specific treatments. How would they differ? Instead of prescribing broad-range antibiotics,  doctors may soon have at their disposal new, cutting edge antidotes that go after a specific kind of harmful bacteria implicated in a particular malady. Instead of depleting the value of a high-power but scattershot pill or dosage, and ignoring its collateral damage on the body, prescriptions would target particular bacteria.

Correlation with obesity: One of Blaser’s most insightful arguments is that the use of antibiotics in farm animals, which accounts for about 80 percent of overall volume in the U.S., is not about disease treatment or prevention. That is why the passage of the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act, or PAMTA, sponsored by Congresswoman Louise Slaughter of Rochester, is so important.

What few observers of our other drug crisis will say, however, and which Blaser does, is the linkage between antibiotics and obesity. The pattern holds in studies of mice, other animals, and humans that higher intake of antibiotics corresponds with a tendency toward obesity. In other words, many livestock owners and marketers know that dispensing antibiotics to food animals disposes an animal to gain weight.

Antibiotic overuse costs billions of dollars in healthcare expense and claims hundreds of lives. Like financial fraud, it ripples throughout our body politic and hurts millions. Warnings of failure in our public-health system are timely.

Whether parents, public health professionals, and concerned residents respond is an open question. Government must respond too. My organization will stay on the case, amplifying voices of reason and leading effective action.

Dr. Martin Blaser received the 2012 recognition from the Peggy Lillis Foundation, and Congresswoman Louise Slaughter was honored in 2013. We hold our gala October 24, 2014, in Brooklyn. To learn more, click here.

Christian John Lillis is the executive director of The Peggy Lillis Memorial Foundation.