A new report presented by the WHO shows that bacterial infections around the world are becoming increasingly harder to treat, and the impact is being felt unevenly across the globe. CIDRAP has the news.
The report presented, from the Global Antimicrobial Resistance and Use Surveillance System (GLASS), revealed that “1 in 6 laboratory-confirmed common bacterial infections were resistant to antibiotics in 2023. From 2018 through 2023, antibiotic resistance rose in more than 40% of the bug-drug combinations monitored, with an average annual increase of 5% to 15%.” Resistance varies widely across regions, with low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) typically faring worst.
Median antibiotic resistance “was most common in urinary tract (1 in 3) and bloodstream infections (1 in 6) and less so in gastrointestinal (1 in 15) and urogenital gonorrheal infections (1 in 125).” Gram-negative pathogens are also becoming increasingly resistant to “Watch” antibiotics, “which are the broad-spectrum antibiotics the WHO has determined should be used for more severe infections.”
Gaps in research and reporting still remain, however. Of the 104 countries who contributed data to the report, fewer than half “reported that they had WHO-recommended core components of a robust national surveillance system. That all adds up to a picture that remains incomplete.” The WHO recommends “improving the coverage and representativeness of AMR surveillance systems should be one of the top priorities for countries.”
