The Rise Of Superbugs

As existing antibiotics cease to tame bacteria due to indiscriminate use and the pipeline for new drugs runs dry, India is staring at a massive public health crisis

- Sonali Acharjee

In March this year, Saanvi Jain, 33, was planning to bring her father back home to Gurugram after a successful gall bladder operation, when he contracted a blood infection in the ICU at Max Hospital in Saket, Delhi. The doctors were concerned, but reassured her that the strong antibiotics they had put him on should see him through. But they didn’t. Saanvi's father developed sepsis, and within no time was gone. Even powerful drugs such as Colistin and carbapenems, which are considered last resort’ ICU drugs in the medical community, could not save him. Doctors suspected antibiotic resistance and asked me whether he had ever taken these medicines before. He had. Only a year ago, he had been given these antibiotics when he was hospitalised for Covid-19. The doctors at Max] said the dose had been too short,” says Jain. Thus, an incomplete round of life-saving drugs cost the 62-year-old his life.