[Experimental phage therapy in the beginning of the 21st century]

Département de microbiologie, unité de biologie moléculaire du gène chez les extrêmophiles, Institut Pasteur, 75724 Paris cedex 15, France. deblaure@pasteur.fr

Phage therapy was gradually abandoned in the middle of the 20th century, and the scientific community has since disregarded this therapeutic approach. Then, at the end of the 20th century, pushed by the necessity to find new solutions to the rapid increase of antibiotic resistant bacteria, some scientists came back to phage therapy. If between 1980 and 2000, the number of scientific articles was low, a substantial increase was noted over the past five years. This is a review of the most recent articles, pointing out new data and questions still to be addressed.

PMID: 18692973 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]