Antibiotic development is incredibly expensive, and most drug-makers don’t invest in it.
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The summit aims to raise awareness of the superbugs’ impact among governments.
United Nations delegates are to sign a “landmark” declaration agreeing to help tackle the threat of antimicrobial resistance, health officials have said. “It doesn’t happen very often for health issues”. To date, the only other health topics discussed at this level are HIV, non-communicable diseases and Ebola.
A report published in WTVM informed, “Infections caused by drug-resistant bacteria cause thousands of deaths every year. No one country, sector or organization can address this issue alone”, Mr. Thomson stressed, at the meeting co-organized by the World Health Organization (WHO), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE).
“We all share responsibility for the development of antimicrobial resistance”, said Monique Eloit, director general of the World Organization for Animal Health.
Jim O’Neill, a former Goldman Sachs chief economist, chaired an independent British commission that agreed with the World Bank. By 2050, if not tackled, it will kill more people than cancer, and cost, globally, more than the size of the current global economy (Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, 2014).
In that time, CARB launched the Antimicrobial Resistance Diagnostic Challenge, a $20 million competition to develop new diagnostic tests that healthcare providers can use to identify antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and distinguish between viral and bacterial infections.
First, they will diminish the environmental footprint generated by antibiotic production, and they will improve access of vulnerable groups to antibiotics, diagnostics, and vaccines. So while older antibiotics become resistant, there aren’t many new antibiotics to take their place.
The U.N.is convening a landmark meeting this week on antibiotic resistance, but scientists are concerned the action may be too late. But the last five years have seen unprecedented levels of urgency. According to the United Kingdom government’s 2014 Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, led by O’Neill, deaths due to antimicrobial resistance could reach 10 million a year by 2050, resulting in an economic loss of over $100 trillion. The more antibiotics people use, the more they generate the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, more popularly identified as “superbugs” – microbes that can not be stopped with drugs. Failure to act may push that number to 10 million by 2050, the report said. And a growing proportion of those prescriptions were for the kinds of drugs that should be used as infrequently as possible to preserve their effectiveness: third- and fourth-generation cephalosporins, macrolides, glycopeptides, β-lactam/β-lactamase inhibitor combinations, carbapenems and tetracyclines. “The biopharmaceutical industry is more aware than numerous importance of challenges and the Declaration highlights what we can do, but also draws attention to where the support of governments and is needed”.
According to a World Bank report titled “Drug-resistant Infections: A Threat to Our Economic Future”, drug-resistant infections are causing economic damage up to 3.5 percent of the global gross domestic product (GDP).
Still, he and other experts said they are encouraged that the issue is getting high-level attention. Nor did it call on countries to make specific financial commitments to new antibiotic development.
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The “political momentum” for the summit has been simmering for the last couple of years, mostly after various hospitals in Ghana, Africa, were shut down for health risks regarding superbugs.
