TY - JOUR T1 - March Focus JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 162 LP - 162 VL - 56 IS - 524 AU - David Jewell Y1 - 2006/03/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/56/524/162.abstract N2 - In his Bad Science column of 11 February, Ben Goldacre has published a powerful reminder of the need to avoid using antibiotics as much as possible.1 It's easy to be casual about the individual decisions, and to forget what they add up to collectively (I do it myself all the time), and it's important to understand the problem from all possible angles and continue to restrict our own prescribing. In the editorial on page 164, Morton Lindbæk restates the problem for GPs: how to pick those who will benefit from antibiotics from the large numbers who can safely be left without them.The conclusion of the study on page 176, examining the consequences of treating or not treating children with acute otitis media, is that we should feel confident we are not harming them … ER -