Opening Remarks 3 



for complacency, when we reflect that this would not be 

 occurring had not the discovery of streptomycin been oppor- 

 tunely followed by those of the antituberculous effects of 

 ^^-aminosalicylic acid and isoniazid. We cannot be sure that the 

 searchers for new drugs and antibiotics will always win the race. 



However hard and successfully we may work in the search 

 for new drugs we shall therefore continue to labour under 

 discouragement so long as we are faced with the bugbear of 

 drug resistance. The problem is one of microbial biochemistry, 

 physiology and genetics, and can only be solved by work in 

 these fields. Until we understand the problem we shall have 

 no hope of overcoming it, and until we overcome it we shall 

 have no real sense of security in our chemotherapy. The sub- 

 ject of this symposium therefore is not only of the greatest 

 scientific interest and importance; it has also a background 

 of practical medical urgency, and I think we should do well to 

 keep this thought in our minds. 



There are, I am sure, plenty of chemists who would be eager 

 to devote their abilities to research in chemotherapy if they 

 could see it as a less empirical subject than it still is. This is 

 obvious indeed from the mass of work that has resulted from 

 the Woods-Fildes hypothesis of metabolic interference, a 

 theory which, born by biochemistry out of microbiology, has 

 been the most encouraging lead that the chemists have yet 

 received from the biologist; it has systematized thought in 

 the search for new drugs, and if its practical yield, apart from 

 the folic acid antagonists, has so far been small, this is in my 

 view because full fructification of the idea cannot be ex- 

 pected until microbiology is further advanced. 



Now a further lead is needed, which can only come from 

 the biochemists and the microbiologists. The greatest en- 

 couragement to chemical research would be the achievement 

 of clearer insight into the development of drug resistance 

 together with even a glimmering of an indication that this 

 phenomenon may ultimately be subject to control. If our 

 discussions bring nearer the day when a confident lead in this 

 direction can be given our time will not have been wasted. 



