The NHS spends over seventeen billion pounds a year on medications
Types of medications
Those that relieve the symptoms of diseases
Those that help treat the disease
Medications that relieve symptoms
They don't actually help cure the problem, they just reduce the symptoms
Medications that help treat the disease
Antibiotics
Antibiotics
They can directly kill bacteria or prevent the growth of new bacteria
Antibiotics don't work on viruses
Antibiotics are made specifically to interfere with bacteria
They can't do anything to viruses
Viruses hide within our body's cells
It's almost impossible to destroy them without destroying our own cells
There are loads of different antibiotics and each one can only kill certain types of bacteria
Doctors might have to do a test to find out which type of bacteria you have before prescribing an antibiotic
Antibiotic resistance is where bacteria become resistant to antibiotics, meaning we can't use the same antibiotics to treat them anymore
Our ability to treat both the symptoms of a disease and the disease itself has revolutionized medicine, both in terms of improving people's quality of life and extending their lives
Loads of people are now being treated with multiple drugs at once, with some making them feel better while other drugs help to fix the root causes of their diseases
