Report on Antibiotic Resistance Across the World
The World Health Organization (WHO) released its first global report on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in 2014, revealing significant trends in bacterial resistance to common antibiotics. This report underscores the growing threat of AMR, with increasing resistance observed in pathogens such as Streptococcus pneumoniae.
According to the report, drug-resistant S. pneumoniae caused an estimated 900,000 infections and 3,600 deaths globally in 2014. More than half of isolates showed resistance to at least one class of antibiotics, and nearly one-third were resistant to two or more classes, including penicillin and macrolides.
The rising resistance contributes to antibiotic-resistant infections that are harder to treat, leading to higher mortality and public health burdens worldwide. WHO emphasized that AMR occurs as bacteria change over time and no longer respond to medicines, complicating prevention and treatment efforts and increasing severe illness and death risk.
The report also includes information on resistance to medicines for treating other infections such as HIV, malaria, tuberculosis, and influenza. For instance, resistance to fluoroquinolones, used for treating urinary tract infections caused by Escherichia coli, is widespread. In some countries, treatment with fluoroquinolones is ineffective in more than half of patients.
Similarly, resistance to carbapenem antibiotics, used for life-threatening infections caused by Klebsiella pneumoniae, has spread to all regions of the world. In some countries, carbapenem antibiotics would no longer work in more than half of people treated for K. pneumoniae infections.
The domestic use of antimicrobial agents needs to be reassessed to ensure that these products do not reduce the effectiveness of medical treatment. Widespread domestic use of antimicrobial compounds is contributing to the development of antibiotic resistance in bacteria in the environment. Household products containing antimicrobial agents such as triclosan and triclorban may contribute to this development.
For example, soaps containing triclosan have been shown to be no more effective at controlling illness in people's homes than ordinary soap. Microbiologist Dr Siouxsie Wiles estimates that the number of potential antibiotic resistance genes that exist is more than 20,000.
Professor Nigel Brown emphasizes the need for scientific research to develop new approaches to tackle AMR. These approaches will include new antibiotics, new rapid-diagnostic devices, and fundamental research to understand how microbes become resistant to drugs and how human behavior influences the spread of resistance.
Antibiotic resistance is happening in every region of the world, according to the WHO report. The latest available statistics from WHO for infection rates estimated that there were 106 million new cases of gonorrhea worldwide in 2008. Treatment failures to third-generation cephalosporins have been reported in several countries, including Austria, Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Norway, South Africa, Slovenia, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
The consequences of antibiotic resistance are severe. People with antibiotic-resistant strains of infections of any bacteria tend to be sick for longer, often require hospitalization, and are at increased risk of death. For instance, people with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) in New Zealand are reported to be 64% more likely to die than people with a non-resistant form of the infection.
Dr Wiles warns that a world without antibiotics is a scary place, and we are likely to be living in that world in as little as 10 years if we do not take action to combat antibiotic resistance. The WHO report serves as a crucial baseline for understanding the scale and urgency of the problem, with more recent reports continuing to document its severe impact.
Science highlights the growing concern of medical-conditions like antimicrobial resistance (AMR), emphasizing its threats to global health-and-wellness. The report mentions that AMR includes resistance to various drugs, such as fluoroquinolones for urinary tract infections and carbapenem antibiotics for Klebsiella pneumoniae infections. The resistance to these medicines complicates treatment efforts and increases the risk of severe illness and death. Therapies and treatments are being researched to tackle AMR, including developing new antibiotics, diagnostics, and understanding antibiotic resistance in microbes and human behavior.
