Word: pneumococci
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...middle-ear infection, which is indeed caused by several different types of bacteria, including Pneumococcus. Left alone, a handful of these infections could lead to permanent hearing loss. And yet their treatment has, in just the past 10 years in the U.S., boosted the prevalence of penicillin-resistant pneumococci to more than...
...just as the pneumococci seem to be gaining the upper hand, medical researchers have developed a powerful new weapon against them. Last week doctors at the University of California in San Francisco reported spectacular success in inoculating a group of 77 vulnerable youngsters with a prototype pneumonia vaccine. All had sickle-cell anemia, a genetic disorder largely confined to blacks that, besides inflicting other damage, impairs the spleen's ability to filter dangerous bacteria out of the blood. Even after two years, Dr. Arthur J. Ammann and his colleagues said, not a single patient had developed a pneumococcus infection...
...National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the vaccine is made from purified bacterial antigens?the chemical keys by which the body recognizes invading germs and orders up antibodies against them. The variety used in San Francisco contained antigens from eight of the most common types of pneumococci. Other recent field trials have involved vaccines with as many as 14 different antigens. Surveying these tests, Dr. Robert Austrian of the University of Pennsylvania concludes that the vaccines are safe, at least 80% effective and apparently provide long-term immunity...
...stubborn case of pneumonia. But after surgery he again developed pneumonia, and analysis of the guilty bacteria proved them to be similar to those identified in Durban. They were astonishingly resistant to penicillin and also to many newer antibiotics. In the boy's case, the hardy new pneumococci finally succumbed to combined doses of rifampin and fusidic acid, but doctors noted that he was already recovering when the drugs were administered...
...says Epidemiologist Fraser, is that patients' relatives and hospital staff members can carry the bacteria in their throats and remain well, yet transmit the infection to others who will become seriously ill. Thus a seemingly healthy air traveler from Johannesburg could, within a day, carry the virulent new pneumococci to any part of the world...