Superbugs, resistant to the strongest anti-biotics, are threatening to bring back all the deadly diseases we thought we had conquered. Back in the day, before Fleming and penicillin, medicine was hardly further along than the days when doctors shook a rattle, raised a blister on the scalp or stuck a leech on you. If you got sick your body either cured itself or you died. We seem to be approaching those days again, where modern medicine is creating creatures smarter than the medicine men, or if not smarter, then at least capable of faster adaptation.

 

 

Back when your health was failin’

You relied upon a Galen

To use his knowledge skills to make you well

But though Galen sure was willin’

He just had no penicillin

And you closed your eyes and heard a slow church bell

And then there came Joe Lister

And he said don’t raise a blister

And he said it loud in no uncertain terms

He said contrary to rumors

Sickness is not caused by humors

But by little beasties I am calling germs

Well in time the docs conceded

Sanitation might be needed

And they started in to washing up their hands

Death by doctor then diminished

But the medics were not finished

For a new drug soon killed germs in all the lands

All because one Alex Fleming

After hawing and some hemming

Showed that penicillin did despite its quirks

Cured all kinds of harsh diseases

To the point where sickness ceases

To concern the docs ‘cause penicillin works

There now came anti-biotics

And new stuff for the psychotics

And the pharma business boomed and profits soared

But we’re doomed for disappointment

There’s a fly in every ointment

And the little beasties gathered up their horde

And proceeded to adapt to

All the drugs that had been mapped to

Cure the ills of everyone the docs could reach

So that now the drugs are failin’

To make cures, we’re back to Galen

And once more we’re back to blisters and the leech

 

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