Researchers looking at Alzheimer’s drug as weapon against superbugs

“We were looking at the effect of zinc toxicity on bacteria, and we thought that using this drug we could transport the zinc and overload the bacteria with zinc, which puts them under stress, which in turn reverses resistance to antibiotics,” he said.

“We would be using the drug in a combination therapy, administering this drug along with an antibiotic the drug is resistant to.”

The drug has had good success in animal models, and the researchers hope to progress to clinical trials soon.

“One of the advantages of our approach is these antibiotics that we’re using have already gone through human trials and we already know that they’re safe,” Dr De Oliveira said.

“So that cuts off a lot of time [from development] because we…