Many antibiotics, which we have taken foregranted since the 1950's, are now becoming ineffective because bacteria have developed ways of acquiring resistance. The development of new antibiotics is lagging behind the loss of the old ones in this race to combat infectious disease. Simultaneously, there is an increase in infectious diseases around the world due to over population, globalization and urbanization. This results in a lethal combination of emerging diseases and loss of effective antibiotics. Multiple factors have contributed to this escalating scenario. The world is now a global village, there is a loss of control of national borders, there are significant populations of aging and immuno-compromised people, there are drastic chnges in global ecology, and migration pathways of animal and insect vectors are changing due to urbanization and global warming. Large networks of epidemiologists and scientists worldwide are now working to coordinate detection, diagnosis and treatment of infectious disease flare-ups in order to contain the threat of epidemics.
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