Antimicrobial Agents: Viral and Bacterial Infections

Antimicrobial Agents
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Antimicrobial Agents
Prompt #1
Antimicrobial agents refer to chemicals, drugs, or some other substance that is utilized in killing or slowing microbial growth (Nimavat, Joshi & Jani, 2014). They are primarily employed in veterinary and human medicine in the prevention, treatment, and control of fungal, viral and bacterial diseases. The agents are classified into biostatic; those that inhibit microbe growth and micro biocidal that kill the microorganisms. The categories of antimicrobial agents include antibiotics, semisynthetic and synthetics. The antibiotics also known as antibacterial such as penicillin are used in both the prevention and treatment of bacterial infections by using one microorganism to counter another. They act by either slowing or killing the growth of the bacteria. Some antibiotics can also be utilized to curb some protozoans and fungi, but are ineffective against viruses. The synthetic antimicrobial agents refer to the chemically manufactured drugs that include anti-viral, anti-malaria, anti-fungal, anti-cancer, and anti-tuberculosis. Finally, the semisynthetic encompass the antibiotics that have undergone chemical modification and are the mostly employed type of antimicrobial agents. They include amoxicillin and methicillin (Nimavat, Joshi & Jani, 2014).
Prompt #2
The right treatment of an infection requires that there is a precise understanding of the distinction between bacterial and viral infection; antibiotics cannot counter viruses. The symptoms that are realized from an attack by either bacteria or a virus are similar and thus the difficulty in distinguishing the two. Also, they are spread through the same methods such as being in contact with food, air, water or surfaces that have contamination and infected animals or people. The primary distinction between viral and bacterial infection is that viral is as a result of virus attack while the bacterial one is due to bacteria. The viral infections can be identified from the systemic occurrence ...