AMR has slowly scaled the ladder of issues that matter
Isabelle Carnell-Holdaway was only 15 when, in 2017, the cystic fibrosis she had endured all her life forced her to have a double lung transplant. CF patients depend on antibiotics every day to keep at bay infections that scar their lung tissue. After her transplant, with her immune system suppressed to prevent rejection of the new organs, Isabelle was even more reliant on the drugs.
But infection did take hold. A strain of the bacteria mycobacterium abscessus, resistant to antibiotics, swept through her body. Her operation wound became livid and red. Her skin erupted in weeping sores. As the drugs failed, consultants at Great Ormond Street prepared for the worst. Then her mother, Jo, after carrying out her own research, asked about using bacteria-killing viruses, known as phage, to do what the antibiotics could not.