After Alexander Fleming鈥檚 1928 discovery of a mold that inhibited Staphylococci bacteria growth and the first treatment of a patient with penicillin , demand for this antibiotic grew rapidly. Unfortunately, due to the difficulties of growing molds and isolating the penicillin molecules from them, the medication was extremely difficult to produce in large scale.
One way to combat the shortage of penicillin was to collect the urine of patients taking it聽and extract the antibiotics found there. Benzylpenicillin (also called penicillin G) has a bioavailability of only around , which means that 70% of the dose you take is excreted in your urine. Scientists found that they could isolate those molecules from a patient鈥檚 urine, purify them, and then use them to treat other patients with bacterial infections. While perhaps unappetizing, this method undoubtedly saved many lives. Penicillin was responsible for the death rate from bacterial pneumonia from 18% during World War I to less than 1% during World War II.
Luckily with the discovery of a different species of penicillin producing fungus on a , as well as improvements in fungus culturing techniques and strategic mutations, penicillin became much easier to produce. Modern penicillin antibiotics have also been developed that are much more bio-available than their early counterparts. In the case of the commonly used amoxicillin, oral bioavailability is roughly .
So, if you ever notice your urine smelling a bit funny while taking a course of antibiotics, don鈥檛 worry too much. Either some antibiotic is being excreted in your pee, making it stink, or you may have just eaten a lot of asparagus.
