The Story of ZYVOX | Begin
Steven J. Brickner, Ph.D.
Douglas K. Hutchinson, Ph.D.
Michael R. Barbachyn, Ph.D.
From the hyperbolic – “Superbugs have climbed out of their cage and into hospitals and nursing homes” – to the clinical – “bacteremia caused by MRSA has a poor prognosis,” reports in the late 1990s of the increasing virulence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and the emergence of vancomycin-resistant strains had the public and medical community worried. 1
Make that, very worried. The threat was real, the risks were unimaginable. “This is not the Andromeda strain,” Fred Tenover, Ph.D., of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cautioned, “but it is close to the bug we have been dreading.” 2
New, more powerful antibiotics were still in development, creating a window of opportunity for the bugs to spread and become, aghast, more resistant and lethal. In large city hospitals, MRSA had been on a rampage. From causing 5-10 % of staph infections in the early 1980s, MRSA was responsible for 40 % just a decade later. In other countries as well, prevalence rates had jumped; by the end of the 1990s, Britain reported prevalence rates of 30 %.
The New York Times, nicknamed the Gray Lady for its renowned seriousness, went so far as to predict that “modern medicine might revert to the days before penicillin, when sore throats could become fatal and patients who walked into the hospital for routine surgery might be carried out in coffins.” 3
For millions of people around the world, and their doctors, the discovery of the antibiotic ZYVOX® (linezolid) came not a minute too soon. This is no exaggeration, for an estimated two million people, each almost certainly fighting a life- or limb-threatening infection, have been treated with ZYVOX since its approval in 2000. In recognition of their contribution to humankind, not to mention their stroke of good timing, Drs. Steven J. Brickner, Michael R. Barbachyn and Douglas K. Hutchinson, the co-inventors of ZYVOX, received the 2007 Discoverers Award, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America’s highest scientific honor.
Douglas K. Hutchinson, Ph.D.
Michael R. Barbachyn, Ph.D.
From the hyperbolic – “Superbugs have climbed out of their cage and into hospitals and nursing homes” – to the clinical – “bacteremia caused by MRSA has a poor prognosis,” reports in the late 1990s of the increasing virulence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and the emergence of vancomycin-resistant strains had the public and medical community worried. 1
Make that, very worried. The threat was real, the risks were unimaginable. “This is not the Andromeda strain,” Fred Tenover, Ph.D., of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cautioned, “but it is close to the bug we have been dreading.” 2
New, more powerful antibiotics were still in development, creating a window of opportunity for the bugs to spread and become, aghast, more resistant and lethal. In large city hospitals, MRSA had been on a rampage. From causing 5-10 % of staph infections in the early 1980s, MRSA was responsible for 40 % just a decade later. In other countries as well, prevalence rates had jumped; by the end of the 1990s, Britain reported prevalence rates of 30 %.
The New York Times, nicknamed the Gray Lady for its renowned seriousness, went so far as to predict that “modern medicine might revert to the days before penicillin, when sore throats could become fatal and patients who walked into the hospital for routine surgery might be carried out in coffins.” 3
For millions of people around the world, and their doctors, the discovery of the antibiotic ZYVOX® (linezolid) came not a minute too soon. This is no exaggeration, for an estimated two million people, each almost certainly fighting a life- or limb-threatening infection, have been treated with ZYVOX since its approval in 2000. In recognition of their contribution to humankind, not to mention their stroke of good timing, Drs. Steven J. Brickner, Michael R. Barbachyn and Douglas K. Hutchinson, the co-inventors of ZYVOX, received the 2007 Discoverers Award, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America’s highest scientific honor.