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TED2015

March 2015

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What do we do when antibiotics don't work any more?

Penicillin changed everything. Infections that had previously killed were suddenly quickly curable. Yet as Maryn McKenna shares in this sobering talk, we've squandered the advantages afforded us by that and later antibiotics. Drug-resistant bacteria mean we're entering a post-antibiotic world -- and it won't be pretty. There are, however, things we can do ... if we start right now.

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Penicillin changed everything. Infections that had previously killed were suddenly quickly curable. Yet as Maryn McKenna shares in this sobering talk, we've squandered the advantages afforded us by that and later antibiotics. Drug-resistant bacteria mean we're entering a post-antibiotic world -- and it won't be pretty. There are, however, things we can do ... if we start right now.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

About the speaker

Public health journalist

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Maryn McKenna recounts the often terrifying stories behind emerging drug-resistant diseases that medical science is barely keeping at bay.

The Review on Antimicrobial Resistance | December 2014 | Article

Antimicrobial Resistance: Tackling a Crisis for the Health and Wealth of Nations

The first report from a two-year project, commissioned by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and headed by the former chief economist of Goldman Sachs, delivers a jaw-dropping estimate of the costs of antibiotic resistance: by the year 2050, up to 10 millions deaths per year, and lost productivity equal to $100 trillion.

The White House | September 2014 | Article

National Strategy for Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria

For decades the European Union led the world in taking legislative and regulatory action to reduce antibiotic use and combat resistance. Now the Obama administration has taken action too, with a multi-part plan that could turn out to be a significant legacy.

Professor Dame Sally Davies | Penguin, 2013 | Book

The Drugs Don't Work

This book by the Chief Medical Officer of the United Kingdom sketches an apocalyptic future in which people who contract everyday infections are locked into isolation until they recover or die.

Maryn McKenna | Medium, 2013 | Article

Imagining the Post-Antibiotics Future

In this article (a finalist for a James Beard Award), I explain how losing antibiotics would undermine not only medicine, but the food supply, our daily lives and much of what holds modern society together.

Maryn McKenna | Free Press, 2010 | Book

Superbug

My 2010 book started my exploration of antibiotic resistance. It presents the story of the rise of resistant organisms through the biography of one bug, MRSA (drug-resistant staph), which has created overlapping epidemics in hospitals, families and farms.

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