A SCOTTISH company has made a major breakthrough in the battle against hospital superbug MRSA with the development of a new type of antibiotic.
MGB Biopharma, which is based in Glasgow, has reported successful pre-clinical trials against the MRSA bug.
MRSA – methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus – is the number one cause of wound infections in Scottish hospitals. It is very difficult to treat because it is resistant to many existing antibiotics.
The company's MGB-BP3 compound, which is being developed under licence from Strathclyde University, represents an entirely new type of antibiotic.
It is only the 12th time that a new so-called class of antibiotic has been discovered – starting with penicillin in the 1920s – and the first since the 1980s, making it potentially one of the most exciting discoveries in microbiology for some time.
According to research published yesterday at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases in London, the new drug has proven to be successful at killing MRSA and other similar bacteria with no signs of resistance.
Hugh Pennington, the emeritus professor of bacteriology at Aberdeen University, said: "History tells us that since penicillin came along, every antibiotic that has come along has become less effective against certain bugs over time.
"We are not quite at a tipping point, but we are getting to a point where new developments from a bug point of view could be very nasty indeed. That's why there's a desperate need to come up with brand new drugs.
"Nothing but good would come from a new drug that was in a new class."
It is MGB's second such announcement in a year. Last autumn it announced that its drug was effective against another hospital superbug, Clostridium Difficile.
Being effective against two major strains of bacteria will more than double the company's earnings potential.
MGB is optimistic research at Strathclyde University will show the drug can also be developed to fight other superbugs and fungal infections.
To date, the company has raised more than £2 million from a selection of public and private backers, and has sufficient funding to last until around the end of this year.
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