Antibiotics

Antibiotics are medicines that are used to kill the harmful bacteria that cause illness and infections.


Antibiotics have been used since the 1930s to treat or prevent a wide variety of infections. Before the discovery of antibiotics, there were very few effectively good ways of fighting infections. Illnesses such as pneumonia, tuberculosis, and typhoid fever were considered untreatable. Sometimes even minor infections could spiral out of control and become very deadly.

In the last several years, antibiotics have become much less effective because people use them more often and incorrectly. Many strains of diseases have become immune to antibiotics due to improper and too frequent use of antibiotics. The more people use antibiotics, the more rapidly the process happens. The newly developed antibiotics used to be able to keep at least a step ahead of the antibiotic resistant bacteria, but that's not the case any more. Now, almost every known disease-causing bacteria is resistant to at least one antibiotic.

Health care experts are particularly concerned about antibiotic resistance in bacteria that cause certain serious infections. Some strains of Staphylococcus aureus, that may cause boils, pneumonia, or blood infections, are resistant to nearly all antibiotics, making these diseases very hard to treat. Many strains of tuberculosis, a very infectious disease, are resistant to one or more of the antibiotics used to cure tuberculosis.

Some people may have certain sensitivities or allergic reactions to certain types of antibiotics, or medical conditions the require them to take other medicines which may cause problems if they take antibiotics. Never drink alcohol and take any prescription drugs. Alcohol will destroy any potential healing qualities of an antibiotic.

Antibiotics may cause a number of side effects such as weight loss in sever reaction cases. Always check up on information concerning any possible side effects of the antibiotic you are taking. Some antibotics are used to treat serious cases of acne, and syphyilis…and can cause some unwanted side effects. Check all the possible side effects for any antibiotic prescribed to you.

Avelox is a prescription oral antibiotic that is used for respiratory tract infections. It works by killing the types of bacteria that are usually the reason and cause for most adult respiratory tract infections.

Amoxicillin is also used as an antibiotic for fish as well as for humans to fight some of the bacterial infections, but it can’t be used for fish that are to be used as food. It is recommended that one keep an updated list of commonly used antibiotics, as the list is aways growing. An alphabetical list of commomly prescribed antibiotics can be found easily online, and bookmarking it for referencing is a good idea.