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Community-acquired bacterial pneumonia (CABP) is among the most common types of pneumonia with 5 million cases each year1, and is a leading cause of death by bacterial infection in the US.2 In recent years, the effectiveness of many antibiotics has declined due to growing antibiotic resistance. At the same time, the discovery and development of new antibiotics is limited. As a result, healthcare providers have fewer options when treating serious infections such as CABP, and they may be forced to use antibiotics that may be more toxic to patients and frequently, more expensive and less effective3.

Lefamulin is a newly released antimicrobial and the first pleuromutilin developed for both intravenous and oral administration in humans with activity against Gram positive, fastidious Gram negative and atypical respiratory bacteria4. Pleuromutilin antibiotics are semisynthetic derivatives of pleuromutilin, isolated from an edible mushroom. This semi-synthetic compound inhibits the synthesis of bacterial proteins resulting in cessation of bacterial growth.3, 4

Lefamulin is available for first-line empiric treatment of community-acquired bacterial pneumonia caused by various micro-organisms such as Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae, Staphylococcus aureus and Legionella pneumophila.

Thermo Fisher Scientific offers lefamulin in the U.S. on the Thermo Scientific™ Sensititre™ Streptococcus STP7F AST Plate. A lefamulin disc is expected to be available in 2023.

Read more on Lefamulin disc evaluation

References

  1. National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) and National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NHAMCS) 2009 - 2010. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ahcd/combined_tables/2009-2010_combined_web_table01.pdf (Last Accessed June 21, 2019).
  2. el Bcheraoui C, Mokdad AH, Dwyer-Lindgren L, et al. Trends and Patterns of Differences in Infectious Disease Mortality Among US Counties, 1980-2014. JAMA. 2018;319(12):1248–1260. doi:10.1001/jama.2018.2089
  3. Nabriva Therapeutics, Meeting the demand for new antibiotics. www.nabriva.com/therapeutics 
  4. Lovatt A.J. et all. 2019. Evaluation of the Oxoid Lefamulin 20 μg Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (AST) Disc Against the Predicate Lefamulin 20 μg AST Disc

Product is 510(k)-cleared but not CE marked and not available for sale in Europe. Availability of products in each country depends on local regulatory marketing authorization status

 

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