Viruses found in the poo of endangered animals could be used to treat diabetic foot ulcers and save the NHS £1 billion a year, a research team led by Professor Graham Stafford has suggested. A team from the University of Sheffield said naturally occurring viruses in the poo – known as bacteriophage or phages – could be included in dressings applied to untreatable ulcers with further research. There are thousands of different types of phages, which selectively target and kill bacteria, even in instances when antibiotics do not work. Phage therapy was first discovered in the early 20th century. The research team, led by Professor Graham Stafford, used poo from various animals, including Guinea baboons, lemurs and Visayan pigs, which are housed at Yorkshire Wildlife Park (YWP).Source: PA
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00:00 At the University of Sheffield we're working with the people here at Yorkshire Wildlife
00:03 Park taking what we call environmental samples but it's really zoopoo and from the zoopoo
00:09 we are looking at what bacteria and what viruses are in there and specifically viruses that
00:14 attack bacteria not humans.
00:16 So we work with colleagues at Northern General Hospital in Sheffield, the microbiology unit
00:21 there who collect the samples from antibiotic resistant infections of people with diabetic
00:26 foot ulcers and the ultimate plan is to collect lots of these viruses that attack the bacteria
00:33 that infect people and try and cure their diabetic foot ulcers and possibly even other
00:39 infections that are antibiotic resistant in the future because the more alternatives to
00:43 antibiotics we can make the less antibiotics we use and the longer they last and the better
00:49 we can cure people in the future.
00:51 We can find animals with bacteria and resistances and viruses all around the environment and
00:59 they're all linked together so the more we can understand what's going on across the
01:04 animal world, the human world and link them all together the better chance we have of
01:08 understanding how we can treat infections in the future.
01:12 So we're doing really well and we've got some from the lemurs, baboons, wallabies,
01:18 fisarcha, warty pigs I think you call them here and a few of the others as well and we're
01:26 continuing to work with the team here to collect more and see if we can find more in the future.