Killing the Cure
Just before I went away on vacation, I got sick. I had a runny nose, was feverish, and was generally feeling difficulty convincing myself that it was worth moving any faster than a sloth. I was therefore pretty thankful to be getting away, thinking, of course, that the rest would do my body good.
While I was away, I treated the symptoms with the standard cocktail of cold medicines and decongestants, but my sickness held on. I thoroughly enjoyed my days, but they generally ended early and by the time the end of dinner rolled around, I was ready for bed. I did fluctuate between feeling better and feeling worse throughout the week, but by the end of the week I was getting worse again. My nose, now not running so much but feeling more like I had stuck a couple of corks up my nostrils and now couldn’t get them out, was the first to indicate to me that my body wasn’t going to fix this on its own. My throat was next to start signaling me as I was getting ready to board my plane, setting off a relentless flurry of coughs which brought with it smacks on my shoulder from my wife to “stop coughing” while on the plane, and I’m sure I put a couple of hypochondriacs sharing the compartment with us into hysteria.
I set up an appointment with my doctor the next day (a Monday), and she confirmed that I had a sinus infection. She deduced it was bacterial from the gunk that had built up in my sinus cavity and prescribed Levaquin (an antibiotic to be taken over 10 days) as a remedy, along with expectorants to help clear the mucous from my sinuses. Interestingly, she debated whether or not to give me the drug because, apparently, she was worried I wouldn’t take the drug through its due course and might stop medicating after day 6 or 7 if I felt better (apparently something that happens a lot). She in fact offered another antibiotic which is only taken over 3 days, because she finds people are more apt to finish their medication the less time they use it.
I was actually quite surprised by her hesitation, and was even more surprised to hear her say that people don’t finish the mediations they’re prescribed, especially antibiotics. When I expressed this to her, she went on to say that there’s even still a demand from people for antibiotics like Amoxicillin to cure what ails them, even if what ails them is viral rather than bacterial (for example, to treat the common cold or the flu).
I was shocked to hear this. I had thought that the information surrounding how to treat a bacterial infection versus how to treat a viral infection had become perfectly clear over the last several years, but apparently the information hasn’t proliferated as much as I thought into society. I want to take this opportunity to provide a public service announcement to anyone reading this blog that believes in antibiotics as a cure-all. They aren’t. Antibiotics treat only those diseases that are borne of bacteria, and do nothing to help cure afflictions caused by viruses.
In general, bacterial infections can be particularly nasty, and are more often life-threatening, than viruses. They start as an already-living organism that enters your body and attacks your cells, multiplying on their own once they’ve fed enough on your organic matter. They require a host insomuch as they need sustenance, and adapt to hostile environments more readily than viruses. Bacteria have a tough outer layer that protects them as they divide, which is attacked by the molecules that make up an antibiotic.
Viruses aren’t really organisms — they only act as a living thing once they’ve started to attack you and your cells. There is no medicinal treatment that will kill a virus (at least, not that I know of). But, thankfully, your body can train to recognize the disease and defend itself against it. You can treat the symptoms, but your body, ultimately, will kill the disease. People mistakenly believe that antibiotics will kill a virus because often when they’ve started to take the pills they’re getting better — but it has nothing to do with the medicine and everything to do with their body attacking the virus on its own.
This is obviously an oversimplification of the process, and though I don’t have a medical degree I know enough to make the assertion that if the doctor is sure you’ve got a virus, it makes sense that he or she wouldn’t prescribe antibiotics for it. Certainly ask questions, and make sure to describe all symptoms, because that will help determine which treatment path you should take.
Perhaps more important than recognizing which diseases antibiotics are capable of treating is recognizing that antibiotics are prescribed in a dosage that is supposed to kill the disease. Therefore, take all of the medication prescribed. Yes, all. Taking less may not only end up causing you to go back to the doctor because you didn’t kill the disease, but it may strengthen the bacteria’s resistance to treatment by the antibiotic. Many types of bacteria are already showing a growing resistance to varying antibiotics, and if the trend continues we’ll have to worry about some particularly nasty disease that can no longer be controlled by conventional means.
I generally avoid taking medications unless I absolutely have to. I’m not saying that people should adopt this mantra into their everyday lives, but I do feel it’s important to follow instructions from your doctor to the letter, and if you don’t understand why things as they are, to ask questions about it. Understanding how these medications work will help us prevent the dilution of our only defense, antibiotics, against a multitude of bacterial infections.
