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Taking multiple courses of antibiotics within a short span of time may do people more harm than good, suggests new research which discovered an association between the number of prescriptions for antibiotics and a higher risk of hospital admissions.

Patients who have had 9 or more antibiotic prescriptions for common infections in the previous three years are 2.26 times more likely to go to hospital with another infection in three or more months, said the researchers.

Patients who had two antibiotic prescriptions were 1.23 times more likely, patients who had three to four prescriptions 1.33 times more likely and patients who had five to eight 1.77 times more likely to go to hospital with another infection.

"We don't know why this is, but overuse of antibiotics might kill the good bacteria in the gut (microbiota) and make us more susceptible to infections, for example," said Professor Tjeerd van Staa from the University of Manchester in Britain.

The study, published in the journal BMC Medicine, is based on the data of two million patients in England and Wales.

The patient records, from 2000 to 2016, covered common infections such as upper respiratory tract, urinary tract, ear and chest infections and excluded long term conditions such as cystic fibrosis and chronic lung disease.

The risks of going to hospital with another infection were related to the number of the antibiotic prescriptions in the previous three years.

A course is defined by the team as being given over a period of one or two weeks.

"GPs (general physicians) care about their patients, and over recent years have worked hard to reduce the prescribing of antibiotics,""Staa said.

"But it is clear GPs do not have the tools to prescribe antibiotics effectively for common infections, especially when patients already have previously used antibiotics.

"They may prescribe numerous courses of antibiotics over several years, which according to our study increases the risk of a more serious infection. That in turn, we show, is linked to hospital admissions," Staa added.

It not clear why hospital admissions are linked to higher prescriptions and research is needed to show what or if any biological factors exist, said the research team.

"Our hope is that, however, a tool we are working for GPs, based on patient history, will be able to calculate the risks associated with taking multiple courses of antibiotics," said Francine Jury from the University of Manchester.

Washington D.C., Apr 4: While consuming a high-diet salt can result in high blood pressure, a recent study has revealed a link between salt-rich diet and weaker immune system.

The study was conducted under the leadership of the University Hospital Bonn, and the results were published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

The research was conducted on mice that were fed a high-salt diet. Later, they were found to suffer from much more severe bacterial infections.

Human volunteers who consumed an additional six grams of salt per day also showed pronounced immune deficiencies.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended a maximum amount of five grams of salt a day.

It corresponds approximately to one level teaspoon. In reality, however, many Germans exceed this limit considerably. 

Figures from the Robert Koch Institute suggest that on average men consume ten, and women more than eight grams a day.

This means that we reach for the salt shaker much more than is good for us. After all, sodium chloride, which is its chemical name, raises blood pressure and thereby increases the risk of heart attack or stroke.

"We have now been able to prove for the first time that excessive salt intake also significantly weakens an important arm of the immune system," said Prof. Dr. Christian Kurts from the Institute of Experimental Immunology at the University of Bonn.

This finding is unexpected, as some studies point in the opposite direction. For example, infections with certain skin parasites in laboratory animals heal significantly faster if these consume a high-salt diet.

The study also sheds light on the fact that the skin serves as a salt reservoir.

"Our results show that this generalization is not accurate," emphasized Katarzyna Jobin, lead author of the study.

The body keeps the salt concentration in the blood and in the various organs largely constant. Otherwise important biological processes would be impaired. The only major exception is the skin which functions as a salt reservoir of the body. This is why the additional intake of sodium chloride works so well for some skin diseases.

However, other parts of the body are not exposed to the additional salt consumed with food. Instead, it is filtered out by the kidneys and excreted in the urine.

"We examined volunteers who consumed six grams of salt in addition to their daily intake," said Prof. Kurts. This is roughly the amount contained in two fast-food meals, i.e. two burgers and two portions of French fries.

After one week, from the results, it showed that the immune cells coped much worse with bacteria after the test subjects had started to eat a high-salt diet.

In human volunteers, excessive salt intake also resulted in increased glucocorticoid levels.

There is no evidence that the Bacille Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine, which is primarily used against tuberculosis, protects people against infection with the novel coronavirus, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

The WHO therefore didn't recommend BCG vaccination for the prevention of COVID-19 in the absence of evidence, according to its daily situation report on Monday, Xinhua news agency reported.

"There is experimental evidence from both animal and human studies that the BCG vaccine has non-specific effects on the immune system. These effects have not been well characterized and their clinical relevance remains unknown," WHO stated.

Two clinical trials addressing the question are underway, and WHO will evaluate the evidence when it is available, it noted.

BCG vaccination prevents severe forms of tuberculosis in children and diversion of local supplies may result in an increase of disease and deaths from the tuberculosis, it warned.