Methods and compositions for preventing infection by a IVibrio /Ispecies

摘要

Compositions and methods are provided for preventing, ameliorating, or treating a disease caused by a species of bacterial genus Vibrio, for example, cholera caused by V. cholerae, the compositions containing two or more strains of lytic bacteriophage that infect and kill Vibrio cells. The bacteriophage are virulent, which replicate intracellularly and lyse and kill the bacteria. Use of two or more strains in a single treatment, as a result of a rate of mutation of the bacteria to simultaneous resistance to all of the bacteriophage to be so low as to be negligible, reduces appearance of phage-resistant bacteria to statistical negligibility. Normal human microbial flora species were not affected. In alternative embodiments of the method and the composition, antibiotic agents or other treatment agents can be administered with a cocktail of the plurality of bacteriophage strains.