New antibiotic tested effective against deadly staph infection By Reuters

By Nancy Lapid

(Reuters) – An antibiotic already used in Europe to treat pneumonia controlled deadly bloodstream infections caused by Staphylococcus aureus bacteria as effectively as the most potent antibiotic currently in use, according to data from a late-stage trial.

Swiss drugmaker Basel Pharmaceutica’s ceftobiprole appeared to be equally effective as the older drug daptomycin in about one in four patients who had particularly difficult-to-treat methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) infections, researchers reported Wednesday in The New England. Medicine Magazine.

“This is an area of ​​real need,” study leader Dr. Thomas Holland of Duke University School of Medicine said in a statement. “It has been more than 15 years since a new antibiotic has been approved for the treatment of S. aureus bacteremia.”

For the study, 390 hospitalized patients with complicated staph infections were randomly assigned to receive infusions of ceftobiprole or daptomycin.

According to the report, treatment was successful in 69.8% of the ceftobiprole group and 68.7% of the daptomycin group. Success was defined as survival, improvement in symptoms, elimination of S. aureus from the blood, no new complications, and no need for other antibiotics.

Gastrointestinal problems were the most common side effect with both medications.

Daptomycin was the most recently approved new antibiotic for S. aureus bacteremia more than 15 years ago, the researchers noted.

“Despite much work in medical science, complicated staph infections still have a 25% 90-day mortality rate,” study co-author Dr. Vance Fowler Jr. of Duke Health said in a statement. . “We need more options to treat these infections.”

In August, Basel Pharmaceutica filed for approval of ceftobiprole with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

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