Brian Pool died fighting superbug no antibiotic could cure

OrbitalDawn

OrbitalDawn

Ulysses Everett McGill
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He died fighting a superbug that no antibiotic in the world could touch.

Wellington teacher Brian Pool is believed to be New Zealand's first victim of an aggressive superbug, caught while he was overseas, that is resistant to every type of antibiotic.

Mr Pool, 68, spent most of the last six months of his life in quarantine, unable to leave his room even to sit in the courtyard.

"It was sad because we couldn't give him a hug, we couldn't really kiss him," twin sister Maureen Dunn said.
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"He just wanted to get out in the sun, and we couldn't take him out.

"Being his twin sister, I would be the one who always rescued him . . . it was terrible, but there was nothing we could do."

Her brother died on July 6, from complications caused by a stroke and unrelated to the bug.

But doctors say his immune system was weakened by fighting the nightmare bacteria.

The adventurous teacher, known for his quirky sense of humour, was living in Vietnam and teaching English when he suffered a brain haemorrhage on January 6.

He had surgery in Vietnam, where part of his skull was removed to relieve pressure on his brain, and was flown to New Zealand.

In Wellington Hospital, he was immediately isolated, a standard precaution for overseas patients.
Tests revealed he was carrying a strain of bacterium known as KPC-Oxa 48 - a "pan-resistant" organism that repels every kind of antibiotic.

"Nothing would touch it. Absolutely nothing," Wellington Hospital clinical microbiologist Mark Jones said yesterday.
"It's the first one that we've ever seen that is resistant to every single antibiotic known.

"This man was in the post-antibiotic era, and this is why so many agencies over the world are raising alarm bells."
Earlier this year, British chief medical officer Sally Davies described resistance to antibiotics as a "catastrophic global threat" that should be ranked alongside terrorism.

New Zealand hospitals are already seeing increasing cases of multi-resistant "superbugs", which can be treated by only a limited number of expensive antibiotics.

Dunn said the family was frightened, and even Mr Pool's doctors did not seem to know what the superbug might do.

"They were **** scared, to put it bluntly, in case these bugs were transferred to another patient or taken out into the community."

The message to others was clear, she said: "Don't have an operation in a hospital overseas."
Wellington Hospital infectious disease physician Michelle Balm said Mr Pool's superbug could have been contracted when he was in hospital in Vietnam, or a few years earlier when he had hernia surgery in India.
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I guess we should expect more 'superbugs' in the future. Guess we have abused antibiotics too much?
 
All we need is one superbug to wipe out the human race... then the lions can live in peace :whistle:
 
Moral of the story: Don't have major surgery in a third world country.
 
People are all so worried about viruses but this is the real problem. By the end of my life this is going to be a big killer.
 
What about legal, assisted euthanasia in such a case?

I'm sure the victim, and the victim's family will prefer that rather than watch the victim suffer long and slowly before dying?
 
Compton_effect said:
We've done a better job of weaponsing bacteria than any Military lab could ever do.
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I wouldn't go that far. Growing these bacteria rapidly in cultures you could likely achieve a superior superbug in a far shorter period of time.

It would be a stupid weapon though. It isn't targeted and once you release it you can't easily stop it.
 
porchrat said:
I wouldn't go that far. Growing these bacteria rapidly in cultures you could likely achieve a superior superbug in a far shorter period of time.

It would be a stupid weapon though. It isn't targeted and once you release it you can't easily stop it.
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Hmm. Makes for a interesting premise for a story. Radical green group spends time making bacteria drug resistant in a attempt to cull humanity.
 
Compton_effect said:
Hmm. Makes for a interesting premise for a story. Radical green group spends time making bacteria drug resistant in a attempt to cull humanity.
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They don't even need to go to all that effort. They would just need to get their hands on some of that remaining smallpox and release that. Nobody has been vaccinated for smallpox in decades. They'd kill millions if not billions before a comprehensive vaccine response was even in the pipeline.

Still it would be an interesting idea. Sounds like a Tom Clancy story :p
 
porchrat said:
They don't even need to go to all that effort. They would just need to get their hands on some of that remaining smallpox and release that. Nobody has been vaccinated for smallpox in decades. They'd kill millions if not billions before a comprehensive vaccine response was even in the pipeline.

Still it would be an interesting idea. Sounds like a Tom Clancy story :p
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Well, that would solve the population growth issue....
 
It's important to note that KPC-Oxa 48 did not kill this man, nor did it kill others who have contracted it (e.g. in Ireland). I'm just puzzled as to why the New Zealanders didn't get in touch with the USA's Center for Disease Control.

porchrat said:
They don't even need to go to all that effort. They would just need to get their hands on some of that remaining smallpox and release that. Nobody has been vaccinated for smallpox in decades. They'd kill millions if not billions before a comprehensive vaccine response was even in the pipeline.

Still it would be an interesting idea. Sounds like a Tom Clancy story :p
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That's pretty much the plot of Rainbow Six, actually.
 
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And thanks to the systematic over prescribing of anti biotics by greedy, apathetic and incompetent doctors....
 
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