Antimicrobial resistance’s slow advance threatens to overshadow urgent action, experts warn

Nigel Brooksby highlights the mounting threat of antimicrobial resistance, emphasising prevention over treatment amid global calls for urgent coordinated action to curb its deadly rise.

Antimicrobial resistance has become one of global health’s most persistent and under-answered warnings, and Nigel Brooksby, executive chair at AMR Bio, argues that familiarity is part of the problem. In a recent article, he said the scale of the threat is well understood but still not met with urgency.

The World Health Organization says antimicrobial resistance was associated with more than 4.7 million deaths in 2021, while a landmark Lancet analysis estimated that drug-resistant infections directly caused 1.27 million deaths in 2019 and contributed to nearly 5 million more. That burden now sits alongside the biggest infectious disease threats of the modern era, yet it rarely triggers a crisis response.

Brooksby’s central point is that AMR advances slowly, unlike Covid-19, which forced rapid system-wide change. Resistance builds through repeated treatment failure, narrowing options and increasing pressure on already stretched health services.

Public policy has focused on stewardship and new antibiotics, both of which remain essential. But drug development is costly, slow and commercially difficult. That is why prevention, he argues, must move centre stage.

The WHO and UN agencies have long called for coordinated action, including better infection control, surveillance, vaccination and a One Health approach spanning human, animal and environmental health. The warning is not new. The difficulty is making it feel immediate.

Link: https://www.ddw-online.com/the-pandemic-we-have-trained-ourselves-to-ignore-43071-202607/