More than 700,000 people die every year globally because of antibiotic-resistant infections, prompting 193 countries in the United Nations pledging to fight the biggest threat to modern medicine. UN member-states had expressed concern over AIDS/HIV and ebola. These nations had also pledged to fight climate change, which was seen as a threat to our planet.
A piece of mould had contaminated Alexander Fleming’s petri dish in a laboratory at Saint Mary’s Hospital in London in 1928. He uncovered it produced a substance called penicillin that killed the bacteria he was studying. And so the wonder drug was born, curbing mortality rate. But now Fleming’s words of caution are coming true. In 1945, as Fleming accepted his Nobel Prize, he warned that there is a danger an ignorant man may administer wrong doses himself and hence make him resistant to the drug.
Doctors observed growing cases of resistance a few decades ago, but now the problem has become alarming. This is because in many countries, antibiotics are available over the counter. People treat themselves with these drugs, most often administering the wrong dose. Sometimes antibiotics are taken when they are not needed. Wrong dosage and misuse of antibiotics lead to drug resistance, which has now become so endemic that it has raised concern at the UN. There is also another habit that leads to drug resistance. Many start a course of antibiotics and then stop midway. This, if repeated over time, can have disastrous consequences.
Health authorities must hold campaigns highlighting the effects of misuse. People should stop treating themselves and instead consult doctors. Regulations must be passed that make it mandatory for patients to produce a prescription if they want to buy antibiotics from pharmacies. This issue must be addressed with urgency because its implications are dangerous.
