UK launches five-year action plan on antimicrobial resistance

The government has released a five-year national action plan and a 20-year vision on how the UK will help contain and control antimicrobial resistance by 2040

Plans include goals such as:

• reduce the number of drug-resistant infections by 10% (5,000 infections) by 2025
• reduce by 15% the use of antibiotics in humans
• prevent each year, by 2024, at least 15,000 patients from contracting infections resulting from their health care

The plan focuses on ensuring the effectiveness of current antibiotics by reducing the number of resistant infections and helping clinicians prescribe drugs appropriately.

New technologies will also be used to collect real-time patient data, helping clinicians understand when to use and store antibiotics in their treatment. This could be followed and adapted anywhere in the world, building the database on antibiotic use and resistance.

The plans cover animals and the environment as well as human health. The government is committed to working with veterinarians and farmers to further reduce the use of antibiotics in animals by 25% between 2016 and 2020, goals to be updated from here 2021.

The pharmaceutical industry should also badume more responsibility for antibiotic resistance. NICE and NHS England will explore a new payment model that pays pharmaceutical companies based on the value of their medicines for the NHS, rather than the number of antibiotics sold.

Antibiotic resistance is expected to kill 10 million people annually by 2050 without action, as indicated in the independent review of antimicrobial resistance. Without effective antibiotics, daily operations such as cesarean sectioning or hip replacement could become too dangerous.

Since 2014, the UK has reduced the number of antibiotics used by more than 7% and sales of antibiotics for food producing animals have dropped by 40%. However, the number of drug-resistant blood infections has increased by 35% between 2013 and 2017.

Health and Social Affairs Secretary Matt Hanbad said, "Imagine a world without antibiotics. Where treatable infections become impossible to treat, where routine surgery such as a hip operation becomes too risky, and where every injury is potentially fatal.

"What would you pbad through the head if your child cut his finger and you knew that there was no longer any antibiotic capable of treating an infection? It was the human condition until almost a century ago. I do not want it to be the future of my children, but maybe it is less that we act.

"As health secretary, responsible for one of the most advanced health care systems in the world, I could not look my children in the eye without knowing that I was doing everything in my power to resolve this. serious problem. We have time to act. But the urgency is now.

"All of us benefit from antibiotics, but we take them too easily for granted, and I shudder at the thought of a world in which their power is diminished. Antimicrobial resistance is as dangerous to humanity as climate change or war. That's why we need an urgent global response. "

Premier Theresa May said, "The increase in antibiotic resistance is a threat that we can not afford to ignore. It is essential to fight the spread of drug-resistant infections before routine operations and minor illnesses are life-threatening.

"I am very proud of the UK's global leadership on this important agenda. We will continue to work with our partners to lead an international action that will protect the health of future generations. "