{"id":19452,"date":"2026-06-02T22:20:48","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:20:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/saamagi-therapia-akhalshobilebs-meningitis\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T22:27:34","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:27:34","slug":"saamagi-therapia-akhalshobilebs-meningitis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/saamagi-therapia-akhalshobilebs-meningitis\/","title":{"rendered":"Therapy for newborn meningitis without antibiotics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Neonatal meningitis is one of the most dangerous and life-threatening infections in infancy. In surviving infants, it often leads to severe complications, such as developmental delays and various types of nervous system damage. Although meningitis in newborns is generally rare, it occurs much more frequently in preterm infants. In developed economies, one out of every 500 preterm infants contracts this disease, while in developing countries, this rate is even higher. One of the main causative agents of this severe infection is a specific K1 strain of Escherichia coli (E. coli). According to a new study published in the journal Nature Communications, scientists from ETH Zurich<\/a> and the University of Basel have developed an innovative method that blocks the transmission of meningitis from mother to newborn using a three-component therapy without the use of antibiotics.<\/p>\n

In a third of healthy adults, E. coli K1 is a completely harmless resident of the intestinal microflora, as it is kept in check by other beneficial bacteria and a developed immune system. The problem arises when a pregnant woman carries this pathogen and transmits it to the baby during childbirth. In preterm infants, whose immunity is still weak, the bacteria that enter the gut pass into the bloodstream and reach the brain, where they cause a severe inflammatory process.<\/p>\n

The team led by Professor Emma Slack and Professor M\u00e9d\u00e9ric Diard decided to stop the infection before it is transmitted to the infant, though E. coli K1 turned out to be a rather formidable opponent. Unlike other similar bacteria, it has a protective, slimy outer capsule that prevents antibodies generated by oral vaccination from binding to it. To overcome this barrier, the scientists created a triple therapy that turns the bacteria’s own defense mechanism against it.<\/p>\n

The strategy begins with the use of bacteriophages\u2014viruses specifically designed to destroy bacteria\u2014which were isolated from wastewater in Lucerne. When the phages attack the bacterium and attach to its capsule, the bacterium undergoes rapid evolution and sheds this protective capsule within less than 24 hours to escape the virus. At this exact moment, the second stage of the therapy kicks in: oral vaccination. Stripped of its capsule, the pathogen becomes completely vulnerable to vaccine-induced antibodies and is significantly weakened. The final, third component is a beneficial, safe probiotic that deprives the weakened E. coli of nutritional resources, occupies its ecological niche, and ultimately expels it from the gut.<\/p>\n

Experiments conducted on pregnant mice showed impressive results. In the untreated group, the pathogen was transmitted to 83 percent of the newborn mice, whereas with the triple therapy, the amount of bacteria in the mothers’ guts decreased so significantly that the infection rate among the newborns dropped to 23 percent, meaning the majority of the newborns were completely protected.<\/p>\n

This discovery is particularly important against the backdrop of rising global antibiotic resistance. E. coli K1 causes not only meningitis but also cystitis and pyelitis, often leading to severe sepsis. The scientists hope that since all three components\u2014vaccines, probiotics, and phages\u2014are already actively used in medicine, creating a single unified capsule for humans will not present great difficulties. In the future, the researchers plan to use this same method to combat other multi-resistant, antibiotic-resistant pathogens.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Neonatal meningitis is one of the most dangerous and life-threatening infections in infancy. In surviving infants, it often leads to severe complications, such as developmental delays and various types of nervous system damage. Although meningitis in newborns is generally rare, it occurs much more frequently in preterm infants. In developed economies, one out of every […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":19453,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1594],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19452"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19452\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19459,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19452\/revisions\/19459"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medscriptum.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}