The Viral War: Bacteriophages (Phages) Are the Deadliest Organisms on Earth

We are completely unaware that a war has been going for billions of years, taking trillions lives every single day. The bacteriophage, sometimes known as a “phage,” is the single deadly organism on Earth and is engaged in this conflict. A phage is a virus that is in between life and death. They also appear to have been created. The shape of their head is an icosahedron, which has 30 edges and 20 faces. It frequently rests on a long tail with strands that resemble legs and houses the genetic material of the virus.

The Hidden Epidemic: Why Phages Might be to Blame for Your Gut Woes

On Earth, phages outnumber all other organisms put together, including bacteria. And they probably exist everywhere there are living things. Right now, there are billions on your fingertips, in your guts, and on your eyelids. Which would worry you considering that phages are largely to blame for fatalities on earth, but you’re fortunate. Even if they slaughter people for breakfast, they merely eliminate bacteria. They kill up to 40% of all germs in the waters every single day.

Phages: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

However, phages also have serious drawbacks. Phages require a host to exist and reproduce, just like any other virus does. They are essentially just genetic material with specialisations. A phage typically targets a single bacteria and sometimes a few of its closely related species. They are its victims. Think of a phage as a cruise missile-like creature that only seeks and kills members of one very unfortunate family. When a phage locates its victim, it links its tail fibres with receptors and punctures the surface with what resembles a needle. The phage squeezes its tail and injects its genetic material in an odd action. The germs take control in a matter of minutes. It is now compelled to produce every component of new phages.

Bacteriophage: How a Little Virus Can Destroy a Bacteria

They only stop after the bacteria are fully loaded with fresh phages. Finally, they create “endolysin,” a potent enzyme that eats a hole through the bacterium. The bacteria sort of vomits out all of its insides and dies as a result of the extreme pressure. The cycle is restarted by the release of fresh phages. Bacteriophages have recently drawn the interest of humans, the second-deadliest species on the planet.

The Phage Problem: We’re Injecting Bacteriophages into Our Desperate Bodies

We’ve just been considering injecting countless numbers of them into our bodies because we screwed up and are feeling a little desperate. A single cut or sip from the wrong puddle in the past may be fatal. We had bacteria as our phages. tiny beasts who relentlessly pursued us. However, approximately a century ago, we discovered a solution in nature. By chance, we discovered fungi that produced antibiotics—compounds that kill bacteria. We had a strong super weapon all of a sudden. Since antibiotics are so effective, we no longer view germs as evil. They only killed the frailest and oldest of us. Antibiotics were administered more frequently and for less serious conditions. Because germs are living, evolving creatures, they began to develop resistance to our weapons one by one as we lost respect for the monsters and the weapon. This went on until we developed bacteria known as “superbugs,” which are resistant to practically everything we have. As we speak, this immunity is becoming more widespread worldwide.

Could Bacteriophages Be the Solution to Superbugs?

By 2050, superbugs may cause more yearly fatalities in humans than cancer. The days when a cut, a bladder infection, or a cough could endanger your life or the lives of those you love are returning. More than 23,000 people every year in the US alone pass away from resistant microorganisms. Phages, our little killer virus robots, appear to be our only hope, though. They can be used intravenously to treat infections. What makes it a good idea to introduce millions of viruses into an infection? Killing bacteria is a particularly specific task for phages. In fact, they are so specialised that humans are fully resistant to them since we are so dissimilar. Every day, we come into contact with billions of phages, and we just politely ignore one another.

How Phages Can Help Us Win the War Against Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria

Antibiotics are like a carpet bomb, destroying everything, even the beneficial bacteria in our intestines that we want to keep there. If we utilise phages to kill bacteria, won’t bacteria find ways to defend themselves since phages are like directed missiles that only hit what they’re designed to? That’s not all there is to it; phages also developed. For billions of years, they and bacteria have engaged in an arms race, and so far, they are winning. Because of this, phages are intelligent weapons that keep become more effective at killing. But even if bacteria developed resistance to our phage, we might be able to prevail. It turns out that bacteria must lose their resistance to antibiotics in order to become resistant to even a small number of phage species. We might be able to put them in a difficult situation. This has already been put to the test on a patient who had run out of options after his thoracic cavities became infected with the dreaded Pseudomonas Aeruginosa bacteria. They can even survive an alcoholic hand gel because they are naturally immune to the majority of antibiotics. After years of pain, a few thousand phages and antibiotics that the bacteria were resistant were immediately put into his chest cavity. The infections had entirely vanished within a few weeks. Sadly, this medication is still in the experimental stage, and pharmaceutical corporations are still hesitant to spend the necessary billions on a remedy that has not yet received formal clearance.

Bacteriophage therapy: the new kid on the block

But finally, things are altering. The largest phage clinical trial to date started in 2016, and phages are drawing increasing amounts of interest. And since antibiotics have been our go-to weapon for a long time, we had better get used to it. Although it may seem strange, injecting the most lethal creature on Earth right into our bodies could prevent millions of deaths.