The fascinating story behind the discovery of Streptomycin

Streptomycin has been referred to as the “wonder drug” due to the transformative effect it had on the prognosis of patients suffering from tuberculosis when it was first discovered. It spurred the discovery and invention of antibiotic drugs within the category know as aminoglycosides. Over the decades, it has saved the lives of millions worldwide. Yet the story of its discovery has largely either been wrongly told or simply forgotten, except to those with a special interest in medical history.

An Overview on Streptomycin: Its Mechanism and Clinical Applications

Streptomycin, a ground breaking antibiotic discovered in the mid-20th century, has played a pivotal role in revolutionizing the treatment of various bacterial infections. Its discovery marked the beginning of the antibiotic era, saving countless lives and significantly improving global public health.

Evidence for Expanding the Role of Streptomycin in the Management of Drug-Resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis

In 2019, the WHO tuberculosis (TB) treatment guidelines were updated to recommend only limited use of streptomycin, in favor of newer agents or amikacin as the preferred aminoglycoside for drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis. However, the emergence of resistance to newer drugs, such as bedaquiline, has prompted a reanalysis of antitubercular drugs in search of untapped potential.

Streptomycin

With the development of more effective anti TB medicines such as rifampicin and isoniazid, streptomycin was replaced in the initial treatment of TB, but is still widely used in the retreatment of TB.

Streptomycin and other drugs to treat Tuberculosis

Streptomycin was the first molecule active against TB; it was isolated by Albert Schatz and Selman Waksman at Rutgers University in the United States

The disputed discovery of streptomycin

Peter Pringle, in Experiment Eleven, chronicles the discovery of streptomycin by Albert Schatz while working in Waksman's laboratory at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Waksman was primarily a soil microbiologist and a world authority on Actinomycetes species. During the late 1930s, and trying to emulate Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin, Waksman set about attempting to identify—with help from the nearby Merck Laboratories—antimicrobial agents produced by microorganisms in soil that, unlike penicillin, would be active against gram-negative organisms.

The Neglected Contribution of Streptomycin to the Tuberculosis Drug Resistance Problem

The airborne pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis is responsible for a present major public health problem worsened by the emergence of drug resistance. M. tuberculosis has acquired and developed streptomycin (STR) resistance mechanisms that have been maintained and transmitted in the population over the last decades.

The True Story of the Discovery of Streptomycin

There are comments in the literature that Waksman and I did not at first fully appreciate the importance of streptomycin. That may have been true for Waksman, but it certainly was not true for me. I wanted to find an antibiotic that would be effective in treating human tuberculosis. That is why, as reported in my doctoral dissertation (Schatz, 1945), I specifically worked with a virulent human strain of the tubercle bacillus.