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A Functioning
Fake Womb
❯
IN A POTENTIAL
BREAKTHROUGH for human
babies born prematurely,
scientists announced this year they’d
successfully removed lamb fetuses
from their mother’s wombs and
raised them into healthy sheep. Their
survival comes thanks to an artificial
placenta — called a BioBag — created
by researchers at the Children’s
Hospital of Philadelphia.
The fake womb consists of a clear
plastic bag filled with electrolytes.
The lamb’s umbilical cord pulls in
nutrients, and its heart pumps blood
through an external oxygenator. The
success caps a decades-long effort
toward a working artificial placenta.
The BioBag could improve
human infant mortality rates and
lower the chances of a premature
baby developing lung problems or
cognitive disorders. But there are
still challenges to scaling the device
for human babies, which are much
smaller than lambs. The scientists
are also refining the electrolyte mix
and studying how to connect human
umbilical cords. They expect human
trials in three to five years.
NATHANIEL SCHARPING❯
FOR YEARS, UNITED STATES public health officials have
watched nervously as drug-resistant superbugs marched
around the world, killing hundreds of thousands of people.
Then in January, a report from the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention revealed that an elderly Nevada woman had died
of a bacterial infection that defied even the biggest guns in the
infection-fighting arsenal. That’s when many U.S. experts sounded
the alarm: Time is running out to stop these deadly pathogens.
“We’re somewhere between total panic and a situation we feel
confident we can manage,” says James Johnson, a professor of
medicine and infectious diseases at the University of Minnesota.
Already, superbugs claim 23,000 American lives every year, and
over the past eight years, the number of hospitalized children who
are resistant to antibiotics has increased sevenfold.
Globally, the situation is much worse: More than 700,000 die
annually from drug-resistant infections, particularly in parts of
Europe, Asia and South Asia. These regions have inadequate
sanitary conditions that create breeding grounds for lethal
pathogens — the Nevada
woman picked up her fatal
bug in India. Some experts
warn that new strains of
drug-resistant bacteria, caused
by years of antibiotic use in
humans and livestock, are
as concerning as Zika and
Ebola. The World Health
Organization identified a
dozen groups of bacteria that
pose the greatest threat.
It could get just as bad in the U.S., warns Johnson. Infected
international travelers can accelerate the superbug spread,
and domestically there is a large population vulnerable to
infection — the frail elderly and people who have compromised
immune systems. If antibiotics become less effective, even routine
procedures like appendectomies and C-sections could be perilous,
and could cause up to 6,300 deaths per year.
Still, the U.S. situation has improved, mainly because of more
vigilance and better infection control techniques in hospitals
where drug-resistant bacteria can be endemic, says John Quale, an
infectious disease specialist at SUNY Downstate Medical Center
in Brooklyn. “We’re doing a better job because people are scared
enough now.”
Some promising antibiotics are in development and should be
available soon, but none is considered the magic bullet. In the
meantime, Johnson says, “we need to find ways to get docs to be
better stewards of antibiotics.” LINDA MARSAESSAY
CLOCK
TICKING ON
SUPERBUGS
Illustration source: Children's Hospital of Philadelphia FROM LEFT: JAY SMITH; JAMES GATHANY/CDCThe superbug CRE, shown in a petri dish,
is resistant to almost all antibiotics.