Helicobacter Pylori antibiotic resistance: what's next?

Antibiotic resistance is a continuous growing problem at a global level. Deaths attributed to infectious disease are typically associated to developing countries. However, the increasing antibiotic resistance reported, especially the existence of multi-resistances strains, may alter this paradigm. Considering this the development of novel antibiotics or novel therapies is an extremely important topic. This commentary addresses the use of phage therapy as the potential next therapy to be applied as a surrogate of antibiotic therapy. The advantages and disadvantages of phage therapy are presented, considering the two principal subclasses of phage therapy: using of all phages or lytic components of phage. To finalize it is described how to screen for phages, using hands-on and in silico approaches, which could be latter tested for phage therapy. The bacterium Helicobacter pylori, responsible for gastritis, peptic ulcer and gastric cancer, infecting about half of the human population and known for the presence of strains especially difficult to eradicate, due to antibiotic resistance, is used as model organism for screening of phages.