Drug-resistant germs will kill millions more people

Since the beginning of the antibiotic era, opportunistic pathogens have developed defense mechanisms faster than humans can develop drugs to combat them.

At the same time, humans are unintentionally giving germs an advantage through excessive use of antibiotics: pathogens that survive contact with antibiotics can pass on their resistance properties.

Now, A new report states If authorities do not take action to develop new drugs, infections with “superbugs” could claim nearly two million lives annually by 2050. That would be a 67.5% increase from the 1.14 million lives lost in this way in 2021.

Another 8.22 million people will die from these infections in 2050, according to a study by Global research project on antimicrobial resistance published this week in the medical journal Lancet.

GRAM is a joint project between the University of Oxford and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington School of Medicine. The report is the most comprehensive assessment to date of the risk of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which the World Health Organization has long identified as one of the Top 10 Threats on global public health.

The publication comes ahead of a United Nations General Assembly meeting later this month to address the issue of drug-resistant pathogens.

“The figures in the Lancet study represent a staggering and unacceptable level of human suffering,” said Henry Skinner, executive director of the AMR Action Fund, a public-private partnership that invests in the development of new antibiotics. He was not involved in the study. “As this study shows, a continued failure of governments to meet their moral obligations to protect and care for their populations will condemn millions of people to a needless death.”

About two-thirds of AMR deaths in 2050 will affect people over 70, the report estimates. Older people are already at higher risk of drug-resistant infections, which often occur in hospitals and care facilities.

Between 1990 and 2021, the report said, the number of deaths due to antimicrobial resistance among people aged 70 and over increased by more than 80%.

Across all age groups, mortality rates due to resistant pathogens are expected to be highest in South Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean.

The development of new antibiotics is painfully slow, especially compared to drugs, where manufacturers have better financial incentives. As important as antibiotics are, they are not intended to be taken long-term like drugs for chronic diseases. The most effective antibiotics must be used as infrequently as possible so that bacteria have less opportunity to develop resistance.

In June The World Health Organization warned that there are currently far too few new antibiotics in the development pipeline worldwide and that existing antibiotics are far from being as innovative as would be necessary to combat the most dangerous microbes.

Of the 32 antibiotics currently being developed against bacteria on the WHO list, List of Priority Bacterial Pathogens 2024According to the organization, only 12 of them used unconventional approaches, which is crucial to curbing the rise of drug resistance. And of those 12, only four were effective against pathogens that the WHO identified as the greatest threat to public health.

The scenario described in the GRAM report is grim but not inevitable, the authors say. Improvements in vaccine distribution and access to clean drinking water and sanitation have helped halve deaths from antibiotic resistance among children under five between 1990 and 2021, even as superbugs continue to spread.

Better infection control measures and accelerated drug development could save up to 92 million lives between 2025 and 2050, the report says.

“The data show that if we take action on better handling, improved access in low- and middle-income countries and new investments to strengthen the antibiotic pipeline, we can save tens of millions of lives,” said James Anderson, chairman of the AMR Industry Alliance.