Skip to content
Skip to main content

About this free course

Download this course

Share this free course

Understanding antibiotic resistance
Understanding antibiotic resistance

Start this free course now. Just create an account and sign in. Enrol and complete the course for a free statement of participation or digital badge if available.

2 Horizontal transfer

Horizontal gene transfer, or horizontal transfer, is the primary mechanism of spread of antibiotic resistance that allows bacteria to spread antibiotic resistance genes rapidly between different bacterial types. As you should be starting to appreciate, the acquisition of antibiotic resistance by new bacterial types is particularly concerning because it can result in multidrug-resistant bacterial strains such as MRSA.

Antibiotic resistance cartoon.
Figure 4 Antibiotic resistance.