The battle against antimicrobial resistance is faltering in the world’s poorest countries, a think-tank has warned.
There is a "startling" lack of progress, according to the Chatham House think-tank on international affairs.
This includes little progress in making changes in research and development into antibiotics and alternatives such as vaccines, it says.
And while high income countries have cut antibiotic use in agriculture, there is a "long way" to go in low and middle income countries, it says.
Researcher Dr Charles Clift writes: "These countries have also failed to prevent over the counter sales of antibiotics, partly because of poor living conditions and lack of hygiene in health care facilities.
"Investments have been made in improving surveillance of antibiotic use and resistance, particularly for humans, but more effort is required to create surveillance systems that provide data sufficiently accurate to influence policy and action. This applies also to antibiotics and resistant genes circulating in the environment."
One organisation seeking to promote improve research through a special Longitude Prize, called for more global incentives for researcher.
Daniel Berman, of Nesta Challenges, said: "Multinational pharmaceutical companies actually have fewer projects to develop antibiotics than they did when the report was launched three years ago. When it comes to diagnostics, although there are exciting new technologies, not enough has been done to convince people that, in the vast majority of cases, diagnostic tests should be run before any antibiotics are prescribed or used."
https://www.chathamhouse.org/publication/review-progress-antimicrobial-resistance
Leave a Reply