Ahead of World Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) Awareness Week, the I am BIO Podcast tells the harrowing story of Bradley Burnam’s journey from patient to “mad scientist” to biotech founder—and what we need to do to stop drug-resistant superbugs in their tracks.
Why it matters: Antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, kills over 1 million people worldwide every year—more than what AIDS, tuberculosis, or malaria kills globally.
Bradley Burnam wasn’t aware of the abscess behind his ear—until he woke up with half of his face, scalp, and ear black and swollen. He immediately had surgery to remove the infected area and was given “big gun drugs”—but was back for another surgery six days later.
“20 surgeries and multiple antibiotic cocktails could not stop the resistant bacteria,” says podcast host Theresa Brady. “It kept coming back.”
He started to do his own research—and created an effective antimicrobial dressing out of his garage. He received FDA approval and founded his company, Turn Therapeutics. But why would a patient need to do this?
“The business model for antibiotics is broken,” says Kevin Outterson, Executive Director of CARB-X, a global non-profit partnership that supports the development of new antimicrobials. “And unlike other drugs, you actually don’t want to use them. You want to take the new antibiotic and use it as little as possible.”
The bipartisan PASTEUR Act would help fix the market by ensuring companies are paid on a subscription basis “ as opposed to paid for selling a million units of it,” explains Outterson.
Listen: Catch the new episode at www.bio.org/podcast or your favorite podcast app.
More Health & Environment News:
The Washington Post: Climate change is hastening Valley fever’s spread across the American West
“Cases have roughly quadrupled over the past two decades, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A key reason for Valley fever’s spread, researchers say, may be human-driven climate change—and they warn that a much larger area of the United States will become vulnerable to the disease in the decades to come.”
