Penicillin, the first antibiotic, was discovered accidentally by Sir Alexander Fleming in 1928. Sir Fleming was growing bacteria on agar plates and accidentally left one of the plates open. A mould started growing on this. Fleming noticed that no bacteria grew
Medical procedures and inventions are constantly being developed and made better. World War 1 was a time in which many of the procedures used today were first thought of and used. It was a time that inspired the doctors and nurses working today, not to mention the fact that it’s a topic that still affects everyone in the world today. Medical advancements made during World War 1 had a major impact on the world as evidenced by those advancements still in use today.
One of the most important wartime technologies ever invented was penicillin because it was inexpensive to manufacture, it was easily producible, and saved the lives of many soldiers would have died of minor infections. Alexander Fleming made an important discovery one day in his lab. “In 1928, he was straightening up a pile of Petri dishes where he had been growing bacteria, but which had been piled in the sink... Some mold was growing on one of the dishes” (PBS, par.2) Penicillin is an easily reproducible resource, it is so easy to grow that...
Antibiotics have always been some of the key contributing factors in the medicinal industry. An example of past antibiotics that greatly contributed to medicine is Penicillin. Penicillin was created in the late 1920s and received widespread clinical use during World War II by helping soldiers who were wounded and risked infection, because of its properties that prevent the creation of peptidoglycan in gram-positive bacteria. However, the older forms of Penicillin have been rendered completely useless because of the rapid evolution of bacteria to resist Penicillin. This has created an eternal race regarding whether people can develop the antibiotics to defeat resistant bacteria fast enough (McDonald, 2013).
In 1928, Alexander Fleming, a Scottish biologist, pharmacologist, and botanist, discovered the first natural antibiotic: Penicillin. All of you reading this have at some point in time made use of his discovery. Penicillin antibiotics were among the first drugs to be effective against many previously serious diseases, such as syphilis and infections caused by staphylococci and streptococci. Antibiotics in general remain one of the cornerstones of modern health care, acting as something we all hope to rely on when we get sick. We could very easily name the 20th century “the age of the antibiotic,” and it would be well deserved, indeed. But time is running out.
Accidents can often turn positive, or in some cases, they can even become revolutionary. The discovery of Penicillin changed the world immensely and it was all due to an accident one day in the lab. Penicillin changed the history of medicine for the better, saving millions of lives since its discovery. Even today, it is used by millions daily, from prescriptions from the pharmacy to life saving drugs in the hospital. However, unless something changes in the near future, history could soon reverse, and the power of penicillin could soon be diminished.
Alexander Fleming was born and grew up in Europe during the late 1800s and early 1900s. He was one of eight children. His family owned a farm that was run by Fleming’s father until he passed away. Fleming attended ordinary high schools within his hometown, but when he was 14, his brother moved to London. Fleming moved with his brother and attended the Polytechnic school. Fleming scored extraordinarily high on his school exams throughout his entire schooling. He attended St. Mary’s Medical School and then went into the military as a military doctor. After his job in the military, Fleming began work at St. Mary’s Medical School. Fleming began research on how to cure the simple illness he found in the soldiers he worked with. It was during this time that Alexander Fleming made a revolutionary contribution to the field of medicine. While throwing out old Petri dishes, Alexander Fleming noticed that mold had developed on his specimen. He studied this further and ended up discovering a new medicine. His accidental discovery of penicillin may not have been planned, but it has changed the pharmaceutical and medical field forever. Penicillin ...
Before WWI, the practice of medicine was far from how it has developed into today. The practice was not advanced, and therefore, had few concrete methods. However, with the beginning of the First World War, there was a great push to improve these methods. Although the war caused much illness and death, it also catalyzed many improvements such as blood transfusions, x-rays, vaccines, and sanitation.
World War One, in its own time, was the most destructive war Earth itself had ever seen, and this was due to the new technology. “There are two groups of people in warfare – those organized to inflict and those organized to repair wounds – and there is little doubt but that in all wars, and in this one in particular, the former have been better prepared for their jobs.” There were many advancements, disadvantages, and foundations involving medicine in World War I. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand on June 28, 1914 started the war, and things spiraled out of control from there. With there being so many existing alliances with countries all over, almost all of Europe became involved. Eventually two sides emerged which were the Central Powers and the Allies. America had tried to stay out of the war, but when Russia backed out in 1917 America slipped in.
World War I was a war of innovation with new artillery and tactics, but also a deadly war in which approximately ten million soldiers died in or injuries sustained from battle. As injuries increased throughout the war, the need for medical assistance was constantly growing. Surgery is considered an art and like art, it evolved and new techniques were developed, making an injury that could kill someone survivable. For instance, in the Civil War most surgeons would immediately amputate and in World War I surgeons began trying much harder to save limbs. Blood transfusion allowed surgeons to reduce patient death from blood loss because of the ample supply of blood from fellow soldiers. Sanitation improvements led to fewer deaths from infection and spreading effective ways to avoid getting sick, making room for those with more urgent conditions. World War I was a gruesome war that led to millions of deaths; however, one positive consequence of this was the improvement in surgery and medical techniques.