Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928. Nearly a century later, antibiotics are one of the biggest weapons in the healthcare arsenal with dozens of different types being prescribed to thousands and thousands of people across the world every day. But are we becoming over-reliant on their use and what would happen if they just stopped working?

To answer this question and to see what the NHS, and Cardiff and Vale UHB specifically, is doing to combat the continual mutation of bacteria which is making them resistant to the drugs we use to treat them, we chat to Dafydd Thomas. Dafydd is a biomedical scientist who specialises in bacteria and who is based at the University Hospital of Wales and the University Dental Hospital. We talk about the science behind the prescribing decisions that healthcare staff make, what would happen if antibiotics stopped working, and how we can all take individual action to help in the fight against bacteria.

I mention this video, which shows the speed at which bacteria mutate to overcome the chemicals in antibiotics and which was the inspiration for this episode when Dafydd used it as part of a presentation he gave at a conference in early 2019. 

If you want to know more or would like to get in touch, e-mail me at [email protected] or contact me on Twitter @CV_UHB