Antibiotic-Resistant Bugs: What Can We Do to Protect Ourselves?

In 2018 the Chief Medical Officer for England, Dame Sally Davies, highlighted very forcefully (1) the dangers we as a nation face due to the potential proliferation of antibiotic resistance towards bacteria. In 2024 Dame Davies, now the UK’s special envoy on antimicrobial resistance (AMR), is still warning of the dangers of the growing number of superbugs resistant to current drugs (2)

It has now been stated quite categorically that there is nothing left in the armoury to destroy these ‘superbugs’.

I am sure the question in many people’s mind is: what can we do?

There is one fact in life that never changes – ‘We always reap what we sow’. Overuse of antibiotics in both people and animals has brought us to this place, where there is a major threat to humanity which, in the words of Dame Sally Davies, is as great as the threat of terrorism. The World Health Organization describes Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) (3) as one of the top global public health and development threats. It is estimated that bacterial AMR was directly responsible for 1.27 million global deaths in 2019 and contributed to 4.95 million deaths.

The global severity of AMR was highlighted in an article in the Lancet (4) in September 2024.

Some people believe that the conventional approach in medicine, which focuses on treating symptoms and controlling disease, often with pharmaceuticals and surgery, is not the only approach. Functional medicine (5) for example tries to treat the root causes of disease and restore healthy function through a personalised patient experience, whilst working together with conventional medicine.

Perhaps the way forward is to reduce our reliance on pharmaceticals, including antibiotics.

There are many things we can do to protect ourselves including:

1. Ensuring we drink plenty of healthy water (6) to help to properly hydrate the body.

2. Eat lots of ‘greens’ (7) and consider taking concentrated green powder to help alkalise the body. 

3. Reduce our consumption of excess meat, dairy and sugars (8) which directly and indirectly increase the acid load on the body. In particular, eliminate processed foods (9)

4. Take plenty of good omega-3 oils. They are vitally important for the health of our heart and brain (10) and for our immunity (11).

5. Make sure you have an adequate supply of trace minerals. Our soils, and consequently our food, is increasingly trace nutrient deficient (12) so it is necessary to supplement with a good trace mineral solution such as a fulvic-acid based natural mineral solution.

6. Exercise and take time for relaxation.

7. Consume probiotic-rich foods and/or high-strength probiotics to maintain gut bacterial diversity (13). Probiotics may reduce the risk for certain infectious diseases and thus reduce our dependence on antibiotics. They may also reduce the risk of antibiotic-associated diarrhoea, and may even reduce the spread of antibiotic resistance (14).

The above will give great support to your body, build your immunity so you'll be much less susceptible to infection and very significantly enhance your survival prospects if a superbug epidemic heads our way. We are seeing the results of fighting against nature, rather than working with it.

Above everything else, take personal responsibility for your health, because if you don’t, no-one else will. 

Written by Roddy Macdonald founder of Water for Health Ltd.

Article Updated on 14/11/24