Antibiotics are one of the most frequently prescribed medications in modern medicine; besides treating bacterial infections, they may often be utilized for prophylactic purposes, including during select viral infections. It has been shown that 74.9% of COVID-19 patients received antibiotics as a part of their treatment regimen during the pandemic. However, studies suggest that the actual incidence of bacterial coinfection was relatively uncommon with a mere 3.5% of overall cases reported. A recent study revealed that antibiotic administration would not improve disease progression or shorten the length of hospitalization in COVID-19 patients; additionally, some antibiotics, such as linezolid, promote the production of free radicals that might be responsible for exacerbated clinical symptoms during and post-infection. Notably, antibiotic use disturbs the normal gut microbiome, and this interference impedes antiviral immune response enhancing severity and susceptibility to a list of viral infections. Thus, resultant augmented severity of these infections may be a consequence of higher susceptibility to respiratory viral co-infection.
Keywords: Antibiotics; COVID; Gut microbiome; Respiratory infection; Viral infection.
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