Antibiotic misuse Antibiotic misuse Antibiotic misuse, sometimes called antibiotic abuse or antibiotic overuse, refers to the misuse or overuse of antibiotics, with potentially serious effects on health. It is a contributing factor to the development of antibiotic resistance, including the creation of multidrug-resistant bacteria, informally called "super bugs": relatively harmless bacteria (such as staphylococcus, enterococcus and acinetobacter) can develop resistance to multiple antibiotics and cause life-threatening infections. Antibiotics have been around since 1928 when penicillin was discovered by Alexander Fleming. In the 1980s, antibiotics that were determined medically important for treatment of animals could be approved under veterinary oversight. In 1996, the
Antibiotic synergy conventional antibiotics. Antibiotic synergy Antibiotic synergy is one of three responses possible when two or more antibiotics are used simultaneously to treat an infection. In the synergistic response, the applied antibiotics work together to produce an effect more potent than if each antibiotic were applied singly. Compare to the additive effect, where the potency of an antibiotic combination is roughly equal to the combined potencies of each antibiotic singly, and antagonistic effect, where the potency of the combination is less than the combined potencies of each antibiotic. Clinical interest in synergism dates back to the early 1950s when practitioners noted