Got colds? Don’t use Antibiotics

got-cold-dont-use-antibiotics

Colds and flu are caused by viruses. Taking antibiotics to treat viral diseases have more bad effects than benefits. According to Dr. Zubairi Djoerban, a specialist in internal medicine and a Professor of the Faculty of medicine at University of Indonesia, when we got colds, neck pain, sneezing, or acute bronchitis, then perhaps the cause is viral. Antibiotics are not able to kill the virus, it doesn’t make the pain feel more comfortable, not speed healing, also can not prevent transmission to others.

Antibiotics are needed to treat diseases caused by bacteria. So there is no point, there is even the bad effects when it’s given to overcome disease caused by fungi or viruses. Use antibiotics incorrectly will make germs and bacteria become resistant.

What is the difference between bacteria and viruses? According to Zubairi, both of which can cause disease, but bacteria are unicellular creatures, whereas the virus is much smaller than bacteria, it only contains a short segment of genetic material that is wrapped in a protein cover. Different from bacteria, virus entry into cells and utilizes part of the cells of infection to reproduce and proliferate. It could be understood that antibiotics cannot kill the virus, because the virus is already merged with human cells.

The problem of antibiotic-resistant became an important public health problem worldwide. Antibiotic resistant bacteria occur, when it’s changed, so that the medicines not effective anymore. Excessive use of antibiotics, can make bacteria become resistant of antibiotics, so once we really need antibiotics, it’s probably ineffective.