Antibiotics Found Unable to Prevent Heart Disease

Antibiotics found unable to prevent heart disease

WASHINGTON, April 20 (Xinhua) — Long-term antibiotic medication against a bacterial infection linked in many studies to heart attacks and clogged arteries does not work to prevent heart problems as scientists expected, showed two large studies to appear on Thursday’s New England Journal of Medicine.

The bacteria is Chlamydia pneumoniae. Its infection can double the risk of developing subsequent heart attacks, and was found in previous studies in more than three-quarters of heart attack patients.

But to the disappointment of the researchers in the above- mentioned two studies, antibiotics showed effect not different from that of the placebos in reducing the risk of heart attack.

One study, led by Dr. J. Thomas Grayston of the University of Washington in Seattle, tested Pfizer’s Zithromax, or azithromycin, in 4,012 heart disease patients who took the drug or a placebo once weekly for more than one year.

The other one, led by Dr. Christopher Cannon of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, used a different and theoretically more powerful antibiotic, Bristol- Myers Squibb’s Tequin, or gatifloxacin. A total of 4,162 patients took the drug or a placebo 10 days monthly for two years.