Antibiotic Resistance For about 50 years, antibiotics have been the answer to many bacterial infections. Antibiotics are chemical substances that are secreted by living things. Doctors prescribed these medicines to cure many diseases. During World War II, it treated one of the biggest killers during wartime - infected wounds. It was the beginning of the antibiotic era. But just when antibiotics were being mass produced, bacteria started to evolve and became resistant to these medicines. Antibiotic resistance can be the result of different things. One cause of resistance could be drug abuse. There are people who believe that when they get sick, antibiotics are the answer.