New antimicrobial agents for Gram-positive infections.
Increasing antimicrobial resistance in Gram-positive bacteria has presented a formidable treatment problem. The enterococci, although traditionally non-virulent pathogens, have been shown, when associated with vancomycin resistance, to have an attributable mortality of approximately 40%. The frightening specter of widespread vancomycin resistance in the more virulent Staphylococcus aureus would have a significantly greater impact. Since the late 1980s, advances have been made in the development of pharmacological weapons against multiply resistant Gram-positive bacterial infections. At least seven new antimicrobial classes that have activity against resistant Gram-positive organisms are in various stages of development. Most are semisynthetic derivatives of known antibiotics; however, importantly, a unique class of antimicrobial agent has also emerged.
Brooks
A K
AK
Departments of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Department of Clinical Pathology, William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak, Michigan 48073, USA.
Zervos
M J
MJ