posted
If Babesia is protozoal, why are antibiotics used?
Anybody want to try to explain?
Thanks.
-------------------- When I lost my grip on Faith in the maze of illness, Hope gently clasped my hand and led on.
RuthRuth Posts: 478 | From California | Registered: Jan 2007
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CaliforniaLyme
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
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posted
Because they work*)!*)!*
Babesia is a piroplasm like malaria- you may not know but Doxycycline is used as prophylactic for malaria!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! If there is not an entrenched infection it will work prophylactially- and many abx will have some effect on established Babs if not eradication-
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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I'm about to use Alinia which kills protozoa. I have a severe case of Babesia, so I don't know how well it will work. I know someone that Alinia cured his cryptosporidium in 3 days.
I'll be taking Alinia for 21 days. I have no idea if that is enough to knock out the severe infection I have or not. I sure hope so!
Kayda
Posts: 582 | From midwest | Registered: Nov 2006
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beachcomber
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posted
Atovaquone and Quinine are not antibiotics. These are 2 of the preferred Rx for Babesiosis. There is some evidence that a macrolide helps Atovaquone to work better. Macrolides are antibiotics.
Posts: 1452 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Protozoa have several life stages--as I understand it, the different forms they take are susceptible to different chemicals.
I think, too, combining the chemical actions of an antibiotic and an antiprotozoal agent will make the antiprotozoal agent more effective, and may keep the creatures from being able to shape-shift.
Posts: 353 | From Florida boonies | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
Just looked up more medical info on this topic.
eMedicine provides fairly detailed write-up on protozoal infections here. It was written by a "Pediatric Infectious Diseases Research Fellow."
From the same page, this on Alinia:
quote:Nitazoxanide (Alinia) -- Inhibits growth of C parvum sporozoites and oocysts and G lamblia trophozoites. Elicits antiprotozoal activity by interfering with pyruvate-ferredoxin oxidoreductase (PFOR) enzyme-dependent electron transfer reaction, which is essential to anaerobic energy metabolism.
Enzymes. Again.
-------------------- When I lost my grip on Faith in the maze of illness, Hope gently clasped my hand and led on.
RuthRuth Posts: 478 | From California | Registered: Jan 2007
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That's a good question! I think some of the antibiotics that work by inhibiting the bacterial ribosomes (which make proteins) also have some effect on mitochondria in eukaryotes (such as parasites and us) which use ribosomes similar to bacterial ribosomes. Like you implied I don't think probably it is not as effective, but probably it is used with a drug that is specifically antiprotozoal.
Good Wishes,
john duncan
-------------------- "...reading the Meditations for long periods can be conducive of melancholy." --qtd. in intro to Meditations Posts: 122 | From San Diego, CA, California, United States | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
I was on a lot of doxy for the first two years after diagnosis (which was several years after the bite). But it did not kill off the babesia. Maybe it just came too late. It took anti-malarials to knock it out.
Possibly doxy will work with an earlier catch or prophylactically, but I suspect the big guns are needed for an entrenched case. So much for this disease going away on its own.
Posts: 8430 | From Not available | Registered: Oct 2000
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