“Overuse of antibiotics made Americans more vulnerable to a strain of bacteria that caused nearly half a million infections and contributed to at least 29,000 deaths in a single year, U.S. public health officials warned in a study published on Wednesday…

In 2010, for example, Brooklyn teacher Peggy Lillis, 56, developed painful diarrhea one morning, her son, Christian Lillis, told reporters.

After a telephone consultation, her doctor prescribed medication not suited to treating C. difficile. She died less than 36 hours later, after emergency room physicians diagnosed her with C. difficile.”

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