Antibiotics predispose to nosocomial infections

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is an important cause of nosocomial infections. However, research is often done with highly pathogenic strains and many of the hospital-acquired MRSA (HA-MRSA) show low pathogenicity in animal models. Lacey et al. found that 2 weeks of pretreatment with a combination of antibiotics led to a drastic increase in pathogenicity of two HA-MRSA strains in mice, causing similar mortality to a control highly pathogenic strain. Interestingly, a similar effect of antibiotic sensitization happened in gnotobiotic mice, which suggests that the effect is not mediated by the microbiota. The authors also ruled out an effect of antibiotics on phagocyte numbers. Moreover, antibiotics also sensitized mice to infection with other ESKAPE pathogens. The authors speculate that antibiotic-dependent susceptibility in the mice might be caused by dehydration and weight loss, although the mechanism has to be confirmed.

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Original article

Lacey, K. A. et al. Microbiome-independent effects of antibiotics in a murine model of nosocomial infections. mBio https://doi.org/10.1128/mbio.01240-22 (2022)
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Nature Reviews Microbiology http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/
Ursula Hofer

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Ursula Hofer
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Correspondence to Ursula Hofer.

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Hofer, U. Antibiotics predispose to nosocomial infections. Nat Rev Microbiol (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-022-00756-3

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Published: 07 June 2022
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-022-00756-3

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