The Battle Against Bacteria

The Overuse of Antibiotics Has Led to the Evolution of New, Resistant 'Superbugs' That Threaten Our Health. We Take a Look at What We Can Do About It
 

- Sarah Marinos

The World Health Organization considers antibiotic resistance “one of the biggest threats to global public health”. A few years ago, then-US President Barack Obama also recognised the threat, and launched a National Action Plan to Combat Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria. At that time, the US Government warned that the emergence of drug-resistance in bacteria was undermining our ability to treat bacterial infections and perform a range of modern medical procedures, including chemotherapy, surgery and organ transplantation.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates drug-resistant bacteria already cause 23,000 deaths and two million illnesses each year in the US. In January, the World Health Organization published the first report of its new Global Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance System (GLASS), highlighting the scale of the problem. Countries are reporting that resistance to penicillin − used for decades to treat diseases including pneumonia − ranges from 0-51 percent. The proportion of bacteria resistant to treatments for bloodstream infections ranges from 0-82 percent, and 8-65 percent of the E. coli bacteria associated with urinary tract infections are now also resistant to mainstream antibiotics.

“Some of the world’s most common − and potentially most dangerous − infections are proving drug-resistant. The report confirms the serious situation of antibiotic resistance worldwide,” says Dr Marc Sprenger, director of WHO’s Antimicrobial Resistance Secretariat.

The sledgehammer approach