Not so compassionate, eh!
In an article entitled ‘Viral Agent - A forgotten weapon for
the post-antibiotic era’, The Walrus, July/Aug., p. 21, (2014) Lisa Jutras, (
http://thewalrus.ca/viral-agent/ ) noted: “In Canada, an estimated twenty-two
patients die every day from hospital-acquired infections, while many more are
left with chronic illnesses that destroy their quality of life”. Jutra’s
article concludes with the discouraging quote: “For now, sick Canadians must
rely on expensive international travel to find relief. It is an irony to which
wary socialist Félix d’Herelle would have been exquisitely attuned”. The article goes on to detail that we have
known how to treat some, perhaps even most, antibiotic-resistant superbug
infections since before antibiotics have been used to treat bacterial
infections and also describes that it was the French-Canadian microbiologist,
Felix d’Herelle, working at the Pasteur Institute, in 1917 who coined the name bacteriophage and
experimented with the possibility of phage therapy – he subsequently worked all
over the world, including Russia, Tbilisi, Georgia, where his efforts survive to
this day in the form of the Phage Therapy Center
(http://www.phagetherapycenter.com ) that treats patients from all over the
world (For his work, d’Herelle was made a laureate of the Canadian Medical Hall
of Fame - http://cdnmedhall.org/dr-f%C3%A9lix-d%E2%80%99h%C3%A9relle ). If you
or a member of your family became a victim of such an antibiotic-resistant
superbug infection, would you know what to do to try and promote a cure or
prolong life after all antibiotic treatments have failed? I am reasonably sure
that Queen Elizabeth would know what to do – she might request that doctors use
phages to treat the infection as you might also conclude if you look at the
picture of a friend (by Internet) who is telling the Queen about phage therapy
( http://www.relax-well.co.uk/ ). You
can also note from this webpage that there will be a workshop in Poland on
phage therapy later this month at the location where sick Canadians could
travel to for treatments for superbug infections – specifically it is the Institute of Immunology and Experimental
Therapy, Polish Academy of Sciences, ( http://www.iitd.pan.wroc.pl/en/Phages ).
(It would be nice if a Canadian journalist attended and reported from that
workshop!) Considering our close relationship with Poland, I believe we should
approach them for assistance to establish 'The Superbug Victim Felix d'Herelle
Memorial Center for Experimental and Compassionate Phage Therapy' to provide
phage therapy to Canadian patients when antibiotics fail or when patients are
allergic to antibiotics. This would be a rather timely action considering the
very recent publication of an article in Future Microbiology, vol. 10, No. 5,
pp. 685-688, ( http://www.futuremedicine.com/doi/full/10.2217/fmb.15.28 ) entitled Re-establishing a place for phage
therapy in Western medicine.
Meanwhile Canadians will continue to suffer from superbug
infections at the rate noted above while many Canadians know that the superbug
issue is to some extend a myth (using the same treatment method and expecting
different outcomes) or to put it another way: It is not easy being a superbug
in a country where all medical professionals know how to use phage therapy when
needed. While phage therapy is not currently "approved" in Canada,
that does not mean it cannot be used since there are both national (special
access program) and international regulatory provisions for legal use -
example:
Declaration of Helsinki, http://www.wma.net/e/policy/b3.htm:
“In the treatment of a patient, where proven prophylactic,
diagnostic and therapeutic methods do not exist or have been ineffective, the
physician, with informed consent from the patient, must be free to use unproven
or new prophylactic, diagnostic and therapeutic measures, if in the physician's
judgement it offers hope of saving life, re-establishing health or alleviating
suffering. Where possible, these measures should be made the object of
research, designed to evaluate their safety and efficacy. In all cases, new
information should be recorded and, where appropriate, published. The other
relevant guidelines of this Declaration should be followed.”
Several European countries, including Poland, Germany and
France, appear to be availing themselves of the compassionate use provisions to
cure superbug infections when antibiotics fail as can be seen from various
articles and videos on the Internet. Or as Horen Wetmore notes in an article
entitled: ‘A Cure Exists For Antibiotic-Resistant Infections. So Why Are
Thousands Of Americans Still Dying’, Prevention, Jan.1, 2015, (
http://www.prevention.com/health/health-concerns/cure-antibiotic-resistance )
on a patient who travelled to the Phage Therapy Center for treatment.
Considering that antibiotic-resistance has been identified
as a threat to modern medicine as many of our new sophisticated medical
procedures cannot be accomplished without prophylactic or curative applications
of antibiotics, will you ask your candidates ‘what their party will do about
the antibiotic-resistance crisis’ if they form the next government or will you
be a passive bystander hoping that you or your family members will never need
such treatments – remember antibiotic-resistant pathogens do not discriminate!
LYTIC PHAGES LOVE BACTERIA, INCLUDING SUPERBUGS, TO DEATH!
