午夜剧场

In 2007, a survey of readers of the British Medical Journal, published by the British Medical Association, investigated the greatest achievements in the history of medical sciences. The results ranked public health first, followed by antibiotics, anesthesia, vaccines, and the discovery of the DNA structure. Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in the 1920s, and it was put into practical use in the 1940s. Since then, numerous antimicrobial drugs have been released. Combined with improvements in public health and the spread of vaccines, infectious diseases that once ranked among the top causes of death became treatable, and it seemed as though the conquest of infectious diseases was imminent.

However, the bacteria that cause disease have also adapted in various ways to protect themselves from antimicrobial drugs, surviving as drug-resistant bacteria. Drug-resistant bacteria are more likely to emerge through the inappropriate use of antimicrobials. Meanwhile, the development of new antimicrobial drugs has stagnated, and there are concerns that effective antimicrobials against resistant bacteria will cease to exist in the future. If no measures are taken against the inappropriate use of antimicrobials, the annual global death toll from drug-resistant bacteria is predicted to rise from the current 700,000 to 10 million by 2050.

Modern medicine is predicated on the effectiveness of antimicrobial drugs. For example, if a patient's immune system is weakened by the use of anticancer drugs or immunosuppressants and they develop an infection, they could die from that infection without effective antimicrobials. Furthermore, antimicrobials are used during surgery to prevent post-operative infections, but if resistant bacteria increase, prevention will become impossible. If effective antimicrobials disappear in this way, both cancer treatment and surgery will become difficult.

Against this background, I am conducting research to overcome drug-resistant bacterial infections. Specifically, my work includes: 1) the development of new antimicrobial drugs with antibacterial activity against resistant bacteria; 2) the development of enzyme inhibitors targeting the enzymes that drug-resistant bacteria use to detoxify antimicrobials; 3) research on drug delivery to ensure antimicrobials accumulate at high concentrations only at the site of infection; and 4) research on individually optimized administration methods to increase the efficacy of antimicrobials and prevent the emergence of resistant bacteria.

As we currently find ourselves returning to the era of Fleming (100 years ago) when infectious diseases raged, we must first prioritize health management and prevention to avoid getting infected, thereby reducing the opportunities for antimicrobial use and extending the lifespan of existing drugs. In the meantime, I hope to develop new drugs and establish administration methods that prevent the emergence of resistant bacteria.