Miaa The reason they don’t give you antibiotics for a viral infection is that antibiotics only work against bacteria, not viruses. Bacteria and viruses are completely different, and they affect your body in different ways.
Antibiotics are designed to kill bacteria or stop them from growing, but viruses don’t work like bacteria. A virus takes over your own cells to reproduce, so antibiotics can’t target it. They only work on living things like bacteria.
If you take antibiotics for a viral infection, they won’t help you get better any faster. In fact, it can actually be harmful. Overusing antibiotics when you don’t need them can lead to antibiotic resistance. This means bacteria can become immune to antibiotics, making future infections harder to treat.
So, doctors only prescribe antibiotics when you really need them—like when you have a bacterial infection, not a virus like a cold or the flu.