New research from the Ineos Oxford Institute (IOI) found a new way to fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria. They discovered that combining three drugs can be really effective.
One of these drugs, meropenem, is a strong antibiotic used when others fail. But bacteria are getting better at resisting it, so scientists are looking for new ways to use it.
In this study, they combined meropenem with two other drugs, InC58 and AVI, to see if it could work better against resistant bacteria.
The researchers tested this combination on 51 types of resistant bacteria. They found that using all three drugs together was much better at stopping the bacteria from growing compared to using just two of the drugs.
This is important because it could lead to new treatments for infections that are hard to treat. However, more research is needed to see if it works in real-life situations like hospitals.
The study was published in the journal Engineering and was supported by the Ineos Oxford Institute for Antimicrobial Research, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, and the Wellcome Trust.