‘Exciting’ new antibiotic that could defeat deadly resistant superbug to be tested on humans
27 May 2025, 09:18 | Updated: 27 May 2025, 09:43
A new antibiotic that could treat a common ‘superbug’ is to be tested on patients.
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The drug Zosurabalpin, is being developed to target one of the bacteria considered to pose the biggest threat to human health.
Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche has announced it is taking the drug into the final phase of testing on humans.
It is the fist drug in 50 years that shows potential in tackling drug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii, which causes pneumonia and sepsis, particularly in patients already in hospital.
Between 40 and 60 per cent of patients infected with the bacteria die.
Michael Lobritz, global head infectious diseases at Roche, said: “Our goal is to contribute new innovations to overcome antimicrobial resistance, one of the biggest infectious disease challenges to public health.”
It is hoped that the drug will be approved by the end of the decade.
Larry Tsai, senior vice president and global head of immunology and product development at Genentech, a unit of Roche, said that the drug-resistant bacteria “are present in every country of the world” .
He said: “the innovative biology involved in this research could potentially reveal new insights into the structure of bacterial membranes, possibly leading to the discovery of new antibiotics in the future”.
Dr Alistair Farley, scientific lead at the Ineos Oxford Institute, has welcomed zosurabalpin as an “exciting development” for the field.
Dr Farley added that it “may provide a route to the development of new drugs”.
Antimicrobial resistance was declared by world leaders to be “one of the most urgent global health threats” at the UN General Assembly earlier this year.
