Page "Drug resistance" Paragraph 4

Drug or toxin or chemical resistance is a consequence of evolution and is a response to pressures imposed on any living organism.

Individual organisms vary in their sensitivity to the drug used and some with greater fitness may be capable of surviving drug treatment.

Drug-resistant traits are accordingly inherited by subsequent offspring, resulting in a population that is more drug-resistant.

Unless the drug used makes sexual reproduction or cell-division or horizontal gene transfer impossible in the entire target population, resistance to the drug will inevitably follow.

This can be seen in cancerous tumours where some cells may develop resistance to the drugs used in chemotherapy.

Chemotherapy causes fibroblasts near tumors to produce large amounts of the protein WNT16B.

This protein stimulates the growth of cancer cells which are drug-resistant.

Malaria in 2012 has become a resurgent threat in South East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, and drug-resistant strains of Plasmodium falciparum are posing massive problems for health authorities.

Leprosy has shown an increasing resistance to dapsone.