As I just stated in an earlier post, antibiotic resistance is in the news so often, it's hard not to comment on it frequently. Here is a good reminder that we are also a part of a larger ecosystem called Earth - http://www.frontiersin.org/Antimicrobials%2c_Resistance_and_Chemotherapy/10.3...


Also reported here in Science - "Large quantities of antibiotic-resistant bacteria enter the environment via municipal -- and especially hospital -- wastewater streams. Although wastewater treatment plants reduce the total number of bacteria, the most hazardous -- multiresistant -- strains appear to withstand or even to be promoted by treatment processes. This was demonstrated by Eawag researchers in a study carried out in Lake Geneva, near Lausanne.

Treated wastewater from the city of Lausanne -- around 90,000 m3 per day -- is released into Vidy Bay (Lake Geneva); the discharge point is located 700 m offshore, at a depth of 30 m. The Lausanne region does not have a pharmaceutical industry or intensive animal production. However, the Lausanne treatment plant receives wastewater not only from the region's 214,000 inhabitants and a number of smaller healthcare centres, but also from a major healthcare facility -- the University Hospital of Canton Vaud (CHUV)."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120322100027.htm


Note that the main source of antibiotic resistance here is flowing out of the hospital into the lake waters. As Director General Chan of the World Health Organization has stated, due to antibiotic resistance, 'hospitals are apt to become known as places that kill, not cure.' This effect is extending to our environment, as well. As we are a part of the environment, that will come back to affect us in other ways.