Letter: Endless saga

From Paul Murphy

I was interested to read your In Brief story on the latest in the war against bacteria
(18 April, p 23). So this time the good guys (us) have created a
beta-lactamase blocker that prevents the bad guys (bacteria) from producing the
enzyme that stops penicillin from preventing the bacteria from creating its
outer shell.

I wonder where it will all end? If we continually force bacteria to mutate
through “unnatural selection”, then I can’t see how it can end.

I predict that in 10 years’ time, the same sentence describing the latest in
the never-ending struggle against bacteria will be a page long and people will
be turning blue trying to say it in one breath.

Perhaps it is time to take a different tack?

London