 Maggots of the common bluebottle can fight off the superbug MRSA, researchers from Manchester University announced a year ago. They discovered that when larvae from the insect were applied to the MRSA-infected foot ulcers of 13 diabetic patients, the infection cleared up except in one case.
Research team head Professor Andrew Bolton said he was confident that the treatment could be just as successful in MRSA infections in other parts of the body. Maggots have been used since the Napoleonic wars and in the American civil war they found that those who survived were the ones with maggots in their wounds which kept them clean. They remove dead tissue and bacteria, leaving the healthy tissue to heal.
That was over a year ago and now researchers say that the secretions from the maggots have showed postive results in fighting MRSA and other hospital infections.
Tests have shown Seraticin to be effective against up to 12 different strains of the superbug Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA), as well as the food poisoning bacterium Escherichia coli and Clostridium difficile.
However it takes approximately 20 cups of maggots to produce just one drop of purified Seraticin at present. Therefore, the next stage will be to confirm its exact identity using mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance analyses in order for us to produce this chemically on a larger scale.
Between 2002 and 2006, almost 16,000 deaths in England and Wales involved C difficile and more than 6,000 deaths were from MRSA.
It's early days yet but Professor Norman Ratcliffe, who led the scientists, said: "It has been a huge team effort to get to this level and I am delighted with our progress, however there is more to do if we are to realise the maximum benefits from this exciting discovery.
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