Study says vitamin C as good as antibiotic for bronchitis

LONDON -- An antibiotic commonly given for acute bronchitis is no better than low-dose vitamin C at treating the coughing attacks, a new study has found.

Millions of people visit doctors every year for acute bronchitis and most receive antibiotics -- even though there's not much evidence antibiotics help, and it seems the condition is most often caused by a virus, not bacteria.

The study, published this week in The Lancet medical journal, concluded that doctors should stop giving the antibiotic azithromycin, known by the brand name Zithromax, to patients with acute bronchitis.

Some experts said the findings confirm that antibiotics in general are useless for acute bronchitis and that no antibiotic, whatever the type, should be given for the condition.

Zithromax is not the only antibiotic experts have doubts about when it comes to treating acute bronchitis.

A recent analysis of studies involving a variety of other antibiotics concluded that while it's possible they might sometimes clear up the cough about a day early, there's a hefty price to pay in side effects.

"It was a maybe, but this study pretty well refutes that," said Dr. Lorne Becker, head of family medicine at the State University of New York Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, who was not involved with the latest research but heads an expert group that regularly analyzes the research on antibiotics and bronchitis.

Becker said he found the evidence definitive.

Zithromax, made by Pfizer, is used to treat many bacterial infections in different parts of the body, most commonly for pneumonia and sexually transmitted chlamydia infections.

Pfizer said its drug targets only bacteria and its approval for use in bronchitis is based on the assumption that sometimes the coughing is caused by one of several bacteria types known to be killed by the drug.

Part of the problem is that it is not easy to tell whether someone's bronchitis is caused by a virus or bacteria. There is no test.