Antibiotics are becoming scarcer and less effective, a study suggests

Experts say this is a global problem because the investment costs in research and marketing provide little if any benefit. As a result, more and more pharmaceutical companies are withdrawing from the development of new antibiotics.

The Foundation for Access to Medicines (FAM), an independent non-profit organization based in the Netherlands, has warned of the huge threat posed by increasing bacterial resistance to drugs, which requires more efforts from the pharmaceutical industry.

According to the German Pharmaceutical Industry Business Association (Vfa), only 68 active substances are in clinical research globally and 292 projects are in the preclinical stage, which is not enough.

According to an article published in a professional magazine lancet By 2022, the number of deaths related to antibiotic resistance is estimated to reach nearly 5 million.

Although it is unclear whether the original pathogen or drug-resistant bacteria is responsible for this process, the article emphasizes that sub-Saharan regions are the most affected regions in the world, but industrialized countries also face this problem.

Drug production has also stalled. According to FAM, most companies that produce antibiotics are large pharmaceutical companies, typically responsible for more than 200 products exported around the world.

If these companies change their strategy and stop producing antibiotics, people, especially in low- and middle-income countries, will no longer have access to antibiotics. As a result, more people around the world will die because they don’t have access to appropriate medicines than from the pathogen itself.

The entity identified more than 100 problem countries that urgently need to improve access to medicines and warned that only a handful of new antibiotics are available in more than a dozen of them, significantly reducing the chances of new medicines reaching their destination. People who need them.

The Netherlands-based group also seeks to influence drug companies to market and distribute their medicines responsibly and not advocate for doctors to overprescribe antibiotics to prevent the emergence of new drug-resistant bacteria.

Some companies are starting to share their knowledge about drug resistance with clinics and researchers. For example, US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer publishes data from its internal monitoring program in a publicly accessible registry.

Other pharmaceutical companies with research and production areas develop marketing strategies for approved drugs with the goal of enabling them to be distributed and used relatively quickly.

However, despite these small advances, the problem is far from solved. The reality is that antibiotic resistance develops very quickly, in less time than it takes for new antibiotics to become available.

On the other hand, experts note that antibiotics often used to treat infections in children are increasingly ineffective. For example, less than 50% of drugs are effective against bacterial illnesses such as ear infections, sepsis or meningitis, according to a study from the University of Sydney.

The World Health Organization (WHO) also warned that the lack of new effective drugs would be particularly dangerous for infants and children, whose immune systems are not fully developed and cannot adequately defend against invading pathogens.

The UN agency also noted that when prescribing antibiotics, not only the precise choice of drug is important, but also the dose taken. The latter is often difficult when antibiotics are given in syrup form, as is often the case with babies and young children, experts say.

Antibiotics are always necessary these days, whether it’s a serious bacterial infection (such as a urinary tract or respiratory streptococcal infection) or otitis media (which many babies and children suffer from, according to the World Health Organization ). Common and prevalent health conditions among children around the world.

Are there alternatives to antibiotics? According to experts, the existing ones are unreliable. For certain infectious diseases, herbs with antibacterial properties can be used. In the case of respiratory infections, saline solutions can relieve symptoms.

However, antibiotics are the most reliable solution, for example, in cases of sepsis, which must be treated immediately. In the worst-case scenario, there is a risk of septic shock, organ failure and, unfortunately, death.

The World Health Organization says the situation is particularly severe in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. In Indonesia and the Philippines, thousands of children die every year because they simply do not have the antibiotics available in Europe, or because the antibiotics that are available are no longer effective.

Therefore, the World Health Organization emphasizes that correct diagnosis is increasingly important. Its experts warned that the pathogen must be identified, its susceptibility to antibiotics analyzed and then the weakest antibiotic with a broad spectrum used. Some things don’t always happen.

To be precise, antibiotic resistance has increased around the world over the past 15 years, according to the World Health Organization, and it still takes a while for new antibiotics to become available.

(Information comes from the institution)