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Drug-resistant bacteria that seem to have come from south Asia have caught the attention of researchers.

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Lawrence McGinty now shows us that the bacteria seem to be unaffected by even the most powerful antibiotics. Here's his report.

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This bug is common enough. We've all heard of it, e. coli. But now scientists have found e. coli and another bacterium called Klebsiella

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that contain a gene that makes them super bugs -- makes them resistant to almost all antibiotics.

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What we're seeing here isn't the spread of a single super bug, rather, it's the spread of resistance between bacteria.

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And this resistance includes the carbapenems, which had been the most powerful,

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most reliable antibiotics in many infections caused by what we call Gram-negative bacteria, bacteria like e. coli and Klebsia (klebsiella).

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What's happening as this resistance spreads is that infections caused by these bacteria become much harder to treat.

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Scientists say the new gene produces an enzyme that kills all known antibiotics apart from two,

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and what's really scaring them is that bacteria can pass on the gene very easily.

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Some doctors, however, say it's all happened before, and antibiotic resistant bacteria haven't cause (shouldn't it be "caused") Armageddon.

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We have these scares that come around from time to time. And I think a degree of skepticism is in order about them.

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There's always been a fear of the emergence of some bug which is resistant to antibiotics, and that is a problem from time to time.

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It's a problem for the public health and infectious diseases people.

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But mercifully, this seems to be a very rare infection, and there's no sign of it spreading with any kind of rapidity.

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So, most people don't need to be unduly concerned about it.

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Indeed, scientists and doctors have been waiting for it to happen.

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Air travel makes it almost inevitable that new bugs and resistance to antibiotics spread more rapidly. 

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This one has been tracked to hospitals in India, where health tourists from Britain have received kidney transplants and other operations. 

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There are still two effective antibiotics,

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but doctors say we have a ten year window to figure out new ways of attacking the resistant bugs before they take a real grip.