Who Invented The Antibiotics? Penicillin is the first antibiotic used in medicine, used to treat infections caused by bacteria. In 1928, British researcher Alexander Fleming accidentally discovers the effects of Penicillin.

From the beginning of that decade, he was dedicated to the investigation of infections caused by wounds.

Penicillin was Invented by Fleming In the Year?

On September 28, 1928, he discovered that a fungus had appeared in one of his crops, which produced a substance that destroyed the infectious bacteria that he cultivated to study.

Alexander Fleming Discoverer of Penicillin

This fungus was the Penicillium chrysogenum, of the Penicillium family, made by which Fleming gave the name of Penicillin to the substance that is produced.

  • The creation of Penicillin was a crucial fact in the history of medicine since it allowed many diseases to be cured that, until the previous century, were considered incurable.
  • Its massive use during the Second World War revealed its therapeutic value as it was used to treat and cure infections caused by war wounds, ushering in the era of antibiotics.
  • This invention gave rise to the era of antibiotics, thus beginning the production of new types of antibiotics whose manufacture is based on the structure of Penicillin itself.

The new antibiotics not only succeeded in curing diseases that were previously believed to be incurable, but also reduced mortality and morbidity rates against clinical infections, increased the population’s fattening rate, and thus increased the life expectancy of the population than before.

 

He died at the hands of infections for which there was no specific treatment. Based on the structure of Penicillin, other types were created: on the one hand, natural penicillins, and on the other, semi-synthetic penicillins. The former are those in which a biotechnical intervention is not necessary for their manufacture, an example is Penicillin G. As for the latter, they are those in which the bacterium is isolated and chemical modifications are made in it, an example of these is Benzylpenicillin.

Given the effectiveness of Penicillin, its anchorage in the collective unconscious led to its abuse, thus using synthetic derivatives such as Amoxicillin or Cloxacillin to self-treat mild infections that, in most cases, do not require treatment with antibiotics.

This fact caused the population to present resistance against the antibiotic, thus demanding the synthesis of a new series of Penicillin more efficient for the treatment of infections that the previous penicillins could no longer cure. This creates new synthetic antibiotics that are much more effective, with a much broader spectrum of action, and at a much cheaper cost than previous ones. (This last fact is perhaps one of the factors that facilitated the abuse of the medication and its subsequent consequences)

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Finally, once again Penicillin takes a turn in the history of medicine by demonstrating its effectiveness in the treatment of animal infections, which is why a new series of suitable antibiotics began to be studied and developed within the veterinary field for animals.