>> "Metabolic pathways in bacteria are targeted by other types
>> of antibiotics, something else that is very different between
>> prokaryotes and eukaryotes."

Christina said:

> Here's a lesson in Biology 101, for those of you who don't know....
> Metabolic pathways are remarkably similar among all life forms.

But one must acknowledge that they are different enough to have spawned a
wide range of different antibiotics, each with its own claim to fame and
method of attack.  Here's a good-looking primer on the specific metabolic
differences that antibiotics exploit to target bacteria with minimal
collateral damage to the host human:

http://atsu.edu/faculty/chamberlain/Website/Lects/Metabo.htm

I will quote the following introductory line:
"Many metabolic activities of the bacterial cell [Prokaryotes] differ
significantly from those in the human cell [Eukaryotes]."

So, while the metabolics are "remarkably similar", they also "differ
significantly".

What the lecture notes says matches up with what the boys at Johns Hopkins
told me when I took their "field medicine" course for trekkers, aid workers,
adventurers, and NGO field workers:

When you go places with sanitation ranging from "none" to "casual", and
where the nearest doctor is a specialist in chanting and herbs, you read up
on things like antibiotics.  I happen to be sending this message from a
location with exactly the sort of casual approach to sanitation that prompts
me to keep all my shots up-to-date, and to pack an eclectic assortment of
prescriptions "just in case".  But both Google and Bee-L are available here
on my phone, part of the process that is slowly turning every place into
something similar to Levittown NY, and every time into something like 1987.



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