They develop an effective antibiotic against one of the most dangerous superbacteria

The World Health Organization (WHO) manages a list of bacteria for which new medications are urgently needed. First is Acinetobacter baumannii, which can cause pneumonia, bacteremia – bacteria in the blood -, meningitis and urinary tract and soft tissue infections, and end the patient's life. 7,414 people die each year in Spain in hospitals and other medical centers from healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Worldwide, the number rises to one million. Research by the Hoffmann-La Roche laboratories in Basel (Switzerland) and Harvard University (USA) has proven that a new class of antibiotics can kill it. Zosurabalpine – that's what it's called – has already cured mice with pneumonia caused by A. baumannii and is in phase I of human testing, the first of the three that any drug has to go through before reaching the market.

Infections from this superbug were first observed on a large scale during the Iraq war around 2003. It appeared among wounded soldiers being treated in hospitals. Because it is in these where it develops. It is found in around 27% of toilets and 20% of hospital floors. In 2001 and 2022, it forced the Intensive Care Units of two Catalan hospitals to close. A. Baummani belongs to the Gram-negative family, especially resistant to antibiotics because they have two protective membranes. Specifically, the external barrier contains lipopolysaccharides (LPS), which prevents drug penetration. In addition to this, it has an enormous capacity for adaptation – a study published in September of last year discovered that they could even remain in a dormant state to wake up some time later -, which makes it survive in the harshest conditions and allows it to colonize different parts of the body.

What zosurabalpine does is prevent LPS from reaching the outer membrane of the bacteria by inhibiting the transport complex that facilitates its movement between the two layers. By losing that first line of protection, the bacteria is more vulnerable to the action of other antibiotics, which could be combined with zosurabalpine to treat this type of infection. For more than 50 years, no new classes of antibiotics have been approved for Gram-negative bacteria. The results of this research have been published this Wednesday in the journal 'Nature'.