— W i l l a m e t t e We e k P r e s e n t s —
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Portland’s
Guide
Publishes October 25 th
DID YOU KNOW?
Pharmaceutical
Companies
Are Accidentally
Creating
“Superbugs”
That Resist
Antibiotics
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The problem of anti-
biotics giving rise
to more dangerous
drug-resistant germs (“super-
bugs”) has been present since
the early days of penicillin, but
it has now reached a crisis, with
companies creating dangerous
superbugs when their factories
leak industrial waste, as reported
by Madlen Davies of the Bureau
of Investigative Journalism in
September 2016.
Factories in China and India—where the majority of world-
wide antibiotics are manufactured—have released “untreated
waste fl uid” into local soils and waters, leading to increases in
antimicrobial resistance that diminish the effectiveness of anti-
biotics and threaten the foundations of modern medicine.
SUPERBUGS HAVE ALREADY KILLED AN
ESTIMATED
2 5 ,0 0 0
PEOPLE ACROSS EUROPE —
“ AS BIG A THREAT
A S T E R R O R I S M .”
THUS GLOBALLY POSING
“After bacteria in the environment become resistant, they
can exchange genetic material with other germs, spreading
antibiotic resistance around the world, according to an assess-
ment issued by the European Public Health Alliance, which
served as the basis for Davies’ news report,” Projected Censored
explained. One strain of drug-resistant bacterium that origi-
nated in India in 2014 has since spread to 70 other countries.
Superbugs have already killed an estimated 25,000 people
across Europe—thus globally posing “as big a threat as terror-
ism,” according to U.K. National Health Service chief medical
offi cer Dame Sally Davies.
Willamette Week OCTOBER 11, 2017 wweek.com
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