BEFORE ANTIBIOTICS, a scratch – even a small one – could be fatal. Every year, countless people died as minor wounds – blisters, cuts and scrapes – became infected with streptococcus and staphylococcus bacteria. Treatments were also limited for bacterial diseases such as typhoid, syphilis, tuberculosis and pneumonia, which claimed thousands of lives each year.
In September 1928 Scottish bacteriologist Alexander Fleming returned, seemed to produce a substance that killed the bacteria around it. Further tests confirmed the antibacterial properties of the substance, which Fleming called “penicillin”.
