Antibiotics: The Inventions That Changed Society

There are many inventions and discoveries that today may have been looked over as they have always been at arms reach to us. However, these inventions were never always readily available and their impact during their creation, changed society in many ways. Antibiotics are one invention that are still crucial and essential to our lives today. Without antibiotics, simple illnesses would leave many dead, as it did prior to their development of antibiotics. It was in 1928, when Alexander Fleming observed a common fungus Penicillium notatum destroy bacteria in a staphylococcus on a culture plate. From this point on antibiotics were known as the “miracle drugs” and their impact was incredible. With the development of antibiotics, it changed the field …show more content…
Without antibiotics, everyday people would die from chronic illnesses that could have been easily treated and cured with these “miracle drugs.” Common illnesses during this time such as tuberculosis and typhoid fever were very deadly and were easily treatable with the help of antibiotics. This is stated in the quote which reads, “Antibiotics, such as streptomycin, chloramphenicol, and tetracycline, provided the first effective means to treat chronic infections, such as tuberculosis or typhoid fever, resulting in a growing belief among medical scientists that infectious disease could now be controlled” (Salem Press). These drugs were all used to effectively cure these life threatening and deadly diseases. This then created hope for the future as scientists now believed they had control over infectious diseases. Later, the amazing effects of penicillin then lead to the production of these drugs by large drug companies. This is evident in the quote which states, “By 1943, the methods for large-scale production of the penicillin had been developed, initially by the Pfizer pharmaceutical firm but eventually by other drug companies, and the drug’s effectiveness in treating infections had been demonstrated” ("The History of Antibiotics"). With this large scale production, antibiotics were now readily available to the public. This would then continue to greatly cure these widespread but treatable illnesses throughout the world. Although these drugs were life-saving and were often referred as the “miracle drugs”, they also had negative impacts. This includes the fact that some antibiotics created life threatening anemia and allergies. This is stated in the quote which reveals, “Use of chloramphenicol resulted in life-threatening anemia in a few patients. Some persons also developed allergies against penicillin, in some cases resulting in life-threatening responses to the presence of