Shigella dysenteriae. The preferred treatment at first involved various forms of sulfa drugs, but Shigella strains soon showed resistance to those sulfas, so medical people turned to newer antibiotics, such as streptomycin and tetracycline. By 1953, strains of Shigella showed resistance also to both of those. Each bacterial strain, though, was resistant to only one drug. It could still be stopped by the others. Then in 1955 a Japanese woman returned from a stay in Hong Kong, sick with dysentery, and Shigella from her feces tested resistant to multiple antibiotics. From that point, resistance
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