An open letter from more than 70 infectious disease and public health experts is urging the Department of Health and Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi to launch a national action plan to tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR), describing it as a “pandemic which is wreaking havoc”.
The group of doctors, scientists and public health advisers, which formally presented the letter to the department last week, warned that antibiotic resistance is becoming a “growing threat” and poses a threat to universal health coverage through the National Health Insurance, writes Liezl Human in GroundUp.
More than 1m deaths a year worldwide are directly caused by AMR and this number is projected to increase. Nearly 5m people die with an antibiotic-resistant infection, and over the next quarter century, around 40m people are projected to die from AMR.
The second edition of the South African Antimicrobial Resistance National Strategy Framework, from 2018-2024, which acknowledged that antimicrobial resistance is “a serious and growing global health security risk”, expired last year.
The open letter also called on the department to reinstate a ministerial advisory committee on AMR or to establish a similar scientific body.
“The lack of a robust scientific advisory body limits the government’s capacity to develop evidence-based policies,” the letter reads. The establishment of a scientific body would “empower the government to make strategic, data-driven decisions to combat this pressing health threat effectively”.
The former Ministerial Advisory Committee was disbanded in November 2023.
Marc Mendelson, an infectious disease specialist at Groote Schuur Hospital who has been outspoken about the threat of AMR for many years, said: “AMR is a pandemic which is wreaking havoc; is not being attended to properly; and not being taken seriously enough in South Africa.”
Mendelson said more and more people are having to be treated for highly resistant bacterial infections in our healthcare system.
AMR leads to an increase in morbidity, mortality, hospital costs, and also has socio-economic consequences, he said. Common medical interventions like surgery also become much riskier with AMR.
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