Drugs - the holy (or unholy) grail of our times. The experts at WebMB have compiled their own list of the most important drugs ever - 10 in fact - based on discussions with John Swann, PhD, a historian at the FDA; Trevor Stone, DSc, head of pharmacology at the University of Glasgow; Leslie Z. Benet, PhD, the first president of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS); and medical historian Stephen Greenberg, PhD.
At the top of the list is penicillin - the first antibiotic. Without penicillin, 75% of the people now alive would not be alive because their parents or grandparents would have succumbed to infections.
Before penicillin, if you had a serious infection, you died.
Ironically, careless use of penicillin -- and many of the drugs that came after it -- allowed germs to develop resistance. It's now a race - and the bugs are catching up.
Will the pharmacology people will be able to keep up with the change in the bugs they are fighting? That's the multi-billion dollar question every drug company is trying to hit the jackpot with. Read more here.
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