Hasta La Gadget!

At the beginning of my career I was involved in a study that aimed at the discovery of potential new antibiotics, and since then I have always had an interest in the subject.

Antibiotics are drugs that are commonly prescribed to treat bacterial infections. This class of compounds is naturally produced by microorganisms as a weapon against infection, as first observed by Alexander Fleming in 1929: the discovery and characterization of penicillin revolutionized the treatment of infectious diseases.

Penicillin was used for the first time to counteract pneumococcal infections among the military personnel during World War II. After the war, it became available for general use and so did other antibiotics. However, soon the optimism started to fade due to the appearance of bacterial strains with the acquired ability to grow in the presence of antibiotics to which they used to be susceptible. This phenomenon is known as antibiotic resistance.

Once resistance appears, the antibiotic loses its ability to cure the infection, and a different, more powerful antibiotic is needed.

Unfortunately, I believe that not many people not working in this sector understand the imminent threat that antibiotic resistance is to the entire world. As the World Health Organisation (WHO) states on their web page: antibiotic resistance is one of the biggest threats to global health today. It can affect anyone, of any age, in any country. This is very true.

Even though resistance is a natural phenomenon, the rate at which the current antibiotics available on the market become ineffective is increased by the misuse of these drugs in humans and animals.

It is, therefore, crucial that we continue the quest towards the discovery of new drugs able to treat these resistant pathogens.

A recent paper published in Nature gives us an intriguing hint of where we should be looking to individuate novel effective compounds. The answer is most captivating: apparently, we do not need to look far, because the answer could already be in our body!

Zipperer and co-workers remind us that the majority of systemic bacterial infections by multi-drug resistant bacteria (which means resistant to the majority of antibiotics available on the market) are caused by bacteria that generally colonise human body surfaces. These bacteria are naturally present in a percentage of the population (for nasal Staphylococcus aureus this percentage is, for example, around 30%), and remain quiescent and controlled by our body generally until the human carrier undergoes surgery or suffers from immunosuppression or trauma. In those instances, multi-drug resistant organisms are more likely to take over and give rise to invasive infections.

If this phenomenon is well recognised, it is not yet perfectly understood how our body prevents colonisation of the pathogen in healthy individuals. What scientists know is that factors involved are complex and related both to the genetics of the host and also to his microbiota (commensal microorganisms that share our body space). In their study, Zipperer and colleagues observed that the bacterium Staphylococcus lugdunensis (S. lugdunensis: a friendly bacterium belonging to our nasal microbiota) plays a crucial role in keeping the potentially multi resistant Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) from invading our nose. In fact, S. lugdunensis is able to produce a molecule (which was named lugdunin in the study) that acts as an antibiotic against S. aureus.

This discovery is invaluable for many reasons. Not only lugdonin is on the right path to becoming a novel potent antibiotic, but also and foremost this is the first reported case in which a probiotic bacterium not belonging to the gut is found to be fundamental for the prevention of systemic infections.
Indeed, the authors state: Our study suggests that the probiotics concept should be extended to body sites other than the gut, such as the nasal mucous membranes.

A good answer to the discovery of new potential antibiotic could be much closer than we thought: so close to be likely already within us. We just need to start looking.

References:

1. Zipperer, A. et al. Human commensals producing a novel antibiotic impair pathogen colonization. Nat. Rev. Drug Discov. 535, 511-516 (2016).
2. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/antibiotic-resistance/en/
3. Diggins, F. The true history of the discovery of penicillin. Biomedical Scientist, 246-249 (2003).
4. Madigan, M. & Martinko, J. Brock Biology of Microorganisms, 11th edn. (2005).
5. Levy, S. & Marshall, B. Antibacterial resistance worldwide: causes, challenges and responses. Nature Medicine 10, S122-129 (2004).
6. Hopwood, J., Levy, S., Wenzel, R. P. & Georgopapadakou, N. A call to arms. Nat. Rev. Drug Discov. 6, 9-12 (2007).

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Experts have said that the bond between grandparents and grandchildren is second only to the parent-child bond. Grandparents and grandkids profoundly affect one another – just because they exist! 

While not directly related, a group of toddlers have formed deep bonds with a group of elderly residents – most of whom are living with dementia – by joining them one morning a week to read their favourite books together.

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In 2007, photographer André Penteado lost his father to suicide. Overwhelmed with grief, Penteado turned to psychotherapy to unpack his feelings, but found that the process, a stalwart in his life until then, wasn’t as helpful as it had been in the past. Seeking another form of healing, he looked up nearby support groups, and finally found what he’d been looking for: a salve through sharing and discussion.

“Attending the first meeting was the most helpful thing I did at that time. Sitting in a room full of people who, without barriers, shared the most extreme experience they had had in their lives, gave me again a sense of belonging,” Penteado explained in an email exchange with The Huffington Post. “Even though I didn’t say anything that night, I was able to understand that I wasn’t alone, that my experience wasn’t unique but was, in fact, something that had happened to lots of people in the past and that, unfortunately, will happen to others in the future.” 

His participation in the group inspired him to work on a photo series that would extend the lessons he’d learned to others who’ve lost loved ones to suicide.

“To have a suicide in one’s family involves a lot of shame, guilt and anger and in many cases people are not encouraged to share their feelings about it,” Penteado said. So, hoping to open avenues of communication about the unfortunately taboo topic, he asked his fellow support group members if he could take their photos, along with photos of the spaces and items of their lost loved ones. Over 20 said yes, and he got to work on his series, “I Am Not Alone.”

In the portraits of his fellow support group members, Penteado frames his subjects head-on, courageously confronting the camera. “I wanted to make clear that we were not ashamed of anything and that we were dealing with it,” he said. “I believe that the more open society is to discuss the hardship of life, the more we will be able to help each other, to have compassion.” 

His images of lost loved one’s rooms are composed meaningfully, with personal items like CDs, plants, books, artwork and clothing on hangers crowding the corners of the frame, rather than occupying the center of the frame. The effect is a feeling of unease, a feeling that the scene extends beyond the photo itself, and a feeling that something from the photo is askew, or missing. 

Penteado said this choice came from his preference for quiet images. “It is very easy to create a photograph that is visually overcharged with emotions,” he said. “I think the world is saturated by this kind of imagery. [It] doesn’t leave anything for the viewer, any room for complexity. It just says: ‘LOOK! EMOTIONS! CAN’T YOU FEEL IT?’ We don’t need photographs that yell at us.”

For Penteado, images that pack less of an overt emotional punch allow room for viewers to roam around, imbuing scenes with memories of their own experiences. He describes his style as generating, “a kind of forensic feeling, an image used just to record something for further analysis.”

And because his subject — grief — is an acute experience, sharp and specific, such openly interpretable imagery might be the perfect way to depict it.

If you or someone you know needs help, call 1-800-273-8255 for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. Outside of the U.S., please visit the International Association for Suicide Prevention for a database of resources.

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When William Greider wrote his 1989 book about the Federal Reserve, it’s not hard to understand why he called it “Secrets of the Temple.” The Fed’s proclamations can make it seem as mysterious as the Oracle of Delphi. (To be fair, nobody has speculated that hallucinogens are involved, as seems to have been the case in Delphi.)

The Fed’s oracular sages gathered in Jackson Hole, Wyoming last week for the central bank’s annual retreat. But this year’s meeting was different: For perhaps the first time in history, some of the Fed’s leaders met with activists who are fighting to change it.

Actually, the Fed’s not as mysterious as it seems. Some of the its behavior can be explained by its hybrid nature as a publicly-created, but partly private, entity. (It’s reportedly the only central bank in the world that is not fully public.) As a result, the Fed’s leaders must struggle to accomplish their goals within a complex set of accountabilities, with multiple boards of directors that include many of the same bankers they are supposed to regulate.

What’s more, even casual utterances by the Fed Chair can roil global markets, so some of her proclamations must remain at least mildly cryptic out of necessity. Janet Yellen gave a lengthy speech last week that covered a number of topics, but this was the phrase heard around the world:

“I believe the case for an increase in the federal funds rate has strengthened in recent months.”

That comment, while noncommittal, provoked a great deal of commentary. Interest rate hikes are a tool for cooling down the economy when it’s “overheating.” That hardly seems to be the case right now. The “case for an increase” may be stronger than it was, but it’s still weaker than the case for waiting. (Economists Dean Baker and L. Josh Bivens have more.)

It’s worth noting that Janet Yellen is the Fed’s chair, not its CEO, and that the Fed’s monetary policy is set by committee. Yellen must satisfy both its public and private constituencies, which means navigating between public demands for accountability and a private-sector penchant for secrecy. She has a tough job.

The Fed has a governance problem. What’s the solution? Some right-wingers want to abolish it altogether, but that’s a terrible idea. Its current design is flawed, but abolishing it would mean surrendering our financial destiny to the bankers whose unchecked greed inevitably leads to fraud and collapse.

As the Oracle at Delphi reportedly once said: “Love of money and nothing else will ruin Sparta.”

Fortunately, there’s another option. The Fed could become a fully public entity, accountable only to the polity that created it. Economists have long fought to insulate the Fed from political influence. But, despite what some of its practitioners seem to believe, economics is neither a priesthood nor a physical science. Economics uses quantitative measurements but is riven by ideological divisions, theoretical arguments, and subjective differences in perception.

The Fed can’t be managed by coolly objective technocrats, because such creatures don’t exist in the real world.

Public accountability is the goal of a “People’s Fed” proposal from Fed Up, the group that organized last week’s meeting between officials and activists. (Here are our own “People’s Fed” thoughts, from 2014.) Fed Up and its allies want the Fed to avoid taking steps that could harm the economy for working people, like a premature rate hike, and appoint leadership that more closely resembles our diverse population.

They also want the Fed to come up with better responses to the interrelated emergencies now plaguing the American majority – including racial and economic inequality, a weak job market, and declining wages. Ultimately, they want the Fed to be publicly governed.

These are not unreasonable requests. The Fed showed remarkable creativity when it responded to Wall Street’s existential crisis in 2008. It invented new fiscal tools, retroactively reclassified non-banking institutions like Goldman Sachs and GE Capital as banks so that they could be rescued and, as we learned through Bernie Sanders’ GAO audit, made enormous sums of money available for the bailout.

Today the middle class faces an existential crisis. Many communities of color are in danger. So are the young people who struggle with unemployment, under-employment, and closed doors of opportunity. The Fed should act as forcefully and imaginatively in the face of their crises as it did for Wall Street’s.

Many of the officials who met with Fed Up’s activists expressed support, at least in principle, for the group’s goals. That’s commendable. But they are hamstrung by, among other things, their own institution’s structure.

As long as the Fed’s organizational culture is dominated by the financial sector, it cannot reflect the American people’s needs, hopes, and values. And as long as its ownership and accountability remain hazy, even an oracle won’t be able to tell us who it’s really here to serve.

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