Introduction

In July 2004, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) released a report called "Bad Bugs, No Drugs." This report identified several species of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that were expected to play a lead role in the next global health crisis to come. The authors cited a high prevalence of drug-resistant infections--362,000 in the US in 2002--and lack of new antibiotics in development as warning signs. Twelve years have passed since the report published, and according to the CDC, >2 million people become infected and >23,000 die from drug-resistant infections every year. A 2009 paper by Boucher et al implicated six actors from their pathology, persistence, and presence in US hospitals: Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacter. They termed them "ESKAPE" pathogens.