Hi, Friends! Happy New Year!
As we kick off 2024, here in the Northeast we’re in the throes of viral season. Unfortunately, the holiday parties we had scheduled this year didn’t pan out: my parents contracted COVID, and my sons and I are recovering from a run-of-the-mill winter respiratory virus, putting our get-togethers on hold. Many of us dread this time of year for the illness that descends upon us, only loosening its grip once the spring hits and the windows open (but then, cue the allergies!). So, today I feel it appropriate to honor a special physician in history: Sir Alexander Fleming.
Alexander Fleming, a Scottish physician and microbiologist, served in WWI. Devastated to see soldiers dying from infections, he began researching staphylococcus bacteria in hopes of finding a cure. At the time, topical antiseptics were the treatment of choice, which helped at the surface, but were useless for deeper injuries, like infected gunshot wounds.
A messy scientist, Alexander Fleming didn’t clean up his staph-filled petri dishes before leaving for a holiday. He left the bacteria-filled dishes in his lab sink—a lazy choice that would go on to save millions of lives.
In September 1928, upon returning from his trip, Dr. Fleming opened one of the petri dishes and discovered fungus growing. Where the fungus grew, the bacteria had been destroyed (Today in the lab, we call this the “zone of inhibition”, it’s how we measure how effective drugs are at killing certain strains of bacteria). He is famously quoted to have turned to his colleague and said, “That’s funny.”
Dr. Fleming grew the fungus in culture and identified it as Penicillium. He immediately began studying the fungus and its antimicrobial properties. Though discovered in 1928, it would be fourteen years before physicians, scientists, and chemists collaborated to find a strain of Penicillium that would grow in abundance, before commercial Penicillin was made available to the public.
The first documented successful use was in 1942: a young woman, Anne Miller, was dying of sepsis after a miscarriage. After being treated with Penicillin, she made a full recovery.
By 1944, Penicillin was being produced and distributed to the public to cure more than just staph infections—it could treat strep, pneumonia, meningitis, and diphtheria, just to name a few.
In 1945, Dr. Fleming was awarded the Nobel Prize for his discovery.
What’s always fascinated me about this story isn’t just the discovery, but how something so incredible happened from what some of us might consider a ‘character flaw’—sloppiness. Discoveries of utmost importance seem to happen when least expected. It’s more than just thinking outside the box, but being true to who you are, that can sometimes help us stumble upon our destiny.
For me, who has a young son on Amoxicillin as we speak for a sinus infection—I couldn’t be more grateful for the sloppy scientist who made this discovery. Though it took a team to purify, produce, study, and distribute Penicillin—it was a simple choice (not cleaning up before leaving), that spun out a series of events that would help discover one of the most important drugs in human history.
Decision or destiny? Perhaps a bit of both.
“One sometimes finds what one is not looking for. When I woke up just after dawn on September 28, 1928, I certainly didn’t plan to revolutionize all medicine by discovering the world’s first antibiotic, or bacteria killer. But I suppose that was exactly what I did.”
-Alexander Fleming
Further reading & sources:
The real story behind penicillin | PBS NewsHour
How Penicillin Owes a Debt to Alexander Fleming’s Slopiness | TIME
AA DaSilva 