Diagnostic developers target antibiotic resistance

When a patient shows up at the clinic with a cough and sore throat, there is no good way of discovering whether the infection is bacterial or viral. As a result, many clinicians prescribe antibiotics without really knowing if the drugs are necessary — a situation that contributes to the worrying rise of antibiotic resistance. But a team of researchers has collected evidence to suggest that by tracking the genetic signature of a patient’s immune response to infection, they will be able to distinguish bacterial infections from other sources of illness.

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