Antibiotics ...

[Rivet]

Couple o' interesting vids.

Fish Antibiotics in a Collapse by Dr Bones - YouTube

Top 5 Antibiotics for SHTF Storage - YouTube

[anatess]

My son's teacher passed away last Saturday.

The reason: Hypoxic encephalopathy, second to acute respiratory failure, second to bronchospasm, second to hypersensitivity to antibiotic.

In English: She had an allergic reaction to an antibiotic that caused her bronchial tract to swell which caused her breathing to be completely blocked which caused her brain to lose oxygen.

She's never had an allergic reaction to anything before. Ever.

Okay, this doesn't relate to the OP but I can't read "antibiotics..." and not think of her.

[Rivet]

That is a tragic event. Sorry to hear of the loss.

[annewandering]

Oh that is terrible, anatess! How is your son dealing with it?

[faif2d]

I have a lot of allergies. Years ago I was taking allergy shots to try to build up my immune system. I had a reaction to one of the shots. This was made worse as I am a slow reactor (normal folks have the reaction in 10 min, it takes me 30 min) I lived in the country about 5 miles from the Dr office. By the time I got home I was starting to have problems breathing. I told my mom to call the Dr and tell him I was coming back in. She wanted me to get my father to drive me. By this time I knew I was in deep S##T! I called for him once and when I did not get an immediate response I left. Driving 80 MPH on gravel roads and 100 on the asphalt. I got to the office and was starting to see spots in front of my eyes. I got to the door and he laid me down and gave me a shot in the vain of Adrenalin. My father got there 10 min later and I asked the doctor if I would have still been alive and he said no. I can feel the pain of the posters son's teacher! It was VERY close in my case.

[annewandering]

you need to keep that adrenalin with you always! Glad you made it through.

[LDSJewess]

Antibiotics can be hard to add to storage because it would be hard to stockpile them for most Americans. Perscription required means trips to the Docotr and since antibiotics are prescribed for infections it would not be easy to get refills for more than you need, no less with the multiple antibiotic drugs that the video suggested.

If you are living in another country that sells over the counter, this will work but unless you can travel to Mexico or Europe etc: not so easy here.

Antibiotics have their place and yes they can be life savers against infectious disease. As with all drugs they can carry side effects so the choice to use them should be with the reasoning that the risk of side effects outweighs the risk of the disease.

Although allergies are no common, yes they happen and life threatening. But for that matter people can have a life threatening or fatal allergy to herbs, walnuts, strawberries and shellfish to name a few.

Antibiotics would be great in storage preparation kits but would need to be recycled or tossed out if not used within expiration dates. Some antibiotics can lose their strength over time, while others like doxycycline can become toxic past the expiration date.

[anatess]

Originally Posted by annewandering

Oh that is terrible, anatess! How is your son dealing with it?

My son is okay. He goes to a Montessori school. In the Montessori, students stay in the same classroom with the same classmates and the same teacher for at least 3 years. But, my son moved Montessoris last school year so he's only been with this teacher one year while some of his classmates has been with her 3 years. So, it affected the other children a lot more. Everyone was so supportive. All the parents came to the school for that last week of school (she died on the weekend before the last week of school) and kept the class going. We had a balloon ceremony where the kids and parents wrote a letter to the teacher, tied it to a biodegradable balloon and we released them all at once. That added a happy moment while we all remembered things about the teacher. One of the parents is also trained to be a grief counsellor, coincidentally, so he held group talks and such for parents and kids. All the other classes wrote notes to all the children in the class to let them know they're thinking about them. And, interestingly, this being a public school Montessori, God or a Higher Power was talked about a lot. The principal didn't shy away from the God discussions. So, all in all, by the end of the week, all the children felt good and comfortable about their teacher "moving on".

Okay back to the OP.

There are homeopathic alternatives to antibiotics. It might be worthwhile to learn of them because these alternatives don't require perscription and might be worth storing in addition to antibiotics that you can get prescriptions for.

[marshac]

There are a zillion different bacteria, and not all antibiotics work on them all. If you're even thinking that you might want to keep drugs on hand, look up lists of "most common" organisms as well as the drug of choice for each of them. If you go to a traveler's clinic, they would most likely write you scripts for a few antibiotics as well as instructions on when to use them. As anatess' story illustrates, antibiotics are serious medications and not to be used on a whim.

The most important question to first ask yourself is "why am I keeping these on hand?" For us the answer is "earthquake"- so what type of infections might you get? Skin/Wound infections (and possible sepsis), GI issues due to contaminated water, etc. Given that penicillin allergies aren't too uncommon, and 20% of penicillin-sensitive people cross-react to cephalosporins, I've tried to constrain my drugs to quinolones (not for kids) and macrolides.

Here's a list of antibiotics I keep on hand-
Doxycycline
Erythromycin
Azithromycin
Ciprofloxacin
Levofloxacin
Moxifloxacin
Ceftriaxone- IM