Why antibiotics do not work on viruses, how resistance develops, where digitalis, aspirin and penicillin came from, and how a new drug is tested before anyone can take it.
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1.What do antibiotics do?
They kill bacteria inside the body, or stop them growing.
2.Give an example of an antibiotic.
Penicillin.
3.Why can antibiotics not be used to treat viral diseases?
Viruses reproduce inside the body's own cells, so a drug that killed them would be very difficult to make without damaging the cells too.
4.Why must specific bacteria be treated with specific antibiotics?
Different antibiotics work on different bacteria, so the right one has to be chosen for the infection.
5.What effect have antibiotics had on medicine?
They have greatly reduced deaths from communicable bacterial diseases.
6.What is antibiotic resistance?
When strains of bacteria are no longer killed by an antibiotic that used to work against them.
7.How does antibiotic resistance develop?
Random mutations produce a bacterium that survives the antibiotic. It reproduces while the others die, so the resistant strain spreads.
8.Give two ways to slow the development of resistance.
Doctors should not prescribe antibiotics for viral infections or non-serious conditions, and patients should always complete the full course.
9.Why should a course of antibiotics be finished?
Stopping early leaves the least susceptible bacteria alive, and they then reproduce and spread resistance.
10.What do painkillers do?
They treat the symptoms of a disease by relieving pain. They do not kill pathogens.
11.Why is it difficult to develop drugs that kill viruses?
Viruses live inside cells, so it is hard to damage the virus without also damaging the cell it is in.
12.Where was digitalis originally extracted from, and what is it used for?
From foxgloves. It is used to treat heart conditions.
13.Where was aspirin originally extracted from, and what is it used for?
From willow bark. It is used as a painkiller and to lower fever.
14.Who discovered penicillin and how?
Alexander Fleming, from mould growing on an agar plate that had killed the bacteria around it.
15.Where do most new drugs come from now?
They are synthesised by chemists in the pharmaceutical industry, although the starting point may still come from a plant.
16.What three things is a new drug tested for?
Toxicity, efficacy and dose.
17.What does efficacy mean?
Whether the drug actually works and produces the effect it is intended to.
18.What is preclinical testing and what is it done on?
The first stage of testing, carried out in a laboratory on cells, tissues and live animals.
19.What happens in clinical trials?
The drug is tested on human volunteers.
20.Why is a very low dose given at the start of clinical testing?
To check the drug is safe in humans before larger amounts are given.
21.Who is a drug first tested on in clinical trials?
Healthy volunteers, to test for safety.
22.What happens if the drug is found to be safe?
It is tested on patients who have the illness, to find the optimum dose and check that it works.
23.What is a placebo?
A substance that looks like the drug but contains no active ingredient, given to one group so the two can be compared.
24.What is a double blind trial?
Neither the patients nor the doctors know who has received the drug and who has received the placebo, until the results are analysed.
25.Why is a double blind trial used?
It removes bias. If either the patient or the doctor knew, their expectations could influence how the results are reported.
26.Why must results be peer reviewed before publication?
So other scientists can check the methods and conclusions, which helps prevent false claims.
27.Why does developing a new drug take so long and cost so much?
Every stage of testing must be completed to prove the drug is safe and effective, and most candidate drugs fail somewhere along the way.
28.Why is it a problem that antibiotics are used in farming?
Widespread use gives bacteria more opportunities to develop resistance, and resistant strains can then affect humans.
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