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WHO fight against antimicrobial resistance

Only a quarter of countries that responded to a World Health Organisation (WHO) survey have national plans to preserve antimicrobial medicines like antibiotics. A new report, which outlines the survey findings, reveals that while much activity is underway and many governments are committed to addressing the problem, there are major gaps in actions needed across all 6 WHO regions to prevent the misuse of antibiotics and reduce spread of antimicrobial resistance.

"This is the single greatest challenge in infectious diseases today," says Dr Keiji Fukuda, the WHO's assistant director-general for health security. "All types of microbes – including many viruses and parasites – are becoming resistant to medicines. Of particularly urgent concern is the development of bacteria that are progressively less treatable by available antibiotics. This is happening in all parts of the world, so all countries must do their part to tackle this global threat."

Issued a year after WHO's first report on the extent of antimicrobial resistance globally, which warned of a "post-antibiotic era", this survey – which was completed by 133 countries in 2013 and 2014 – is the first to capture governments' own assessments of their response to resistance to antimicrobial medicines used to treat conditions such as bloodstream infections, pneumonia, tuberculosis (TB), malaria and HIV. It summarises current practices and structures aimed to address the issue, and shows there are significant areas for improvement.

"While there is a lot to be encouraged by, much more work needs to be done to combat one of the most serious global health threats of our time," says Fukuda. "Scientists, medical practitioners and other authorities including the WHO have been sounding the warning of the potentially catastrophic impact of ignoring antibiotic resistance. Today, we welcome what has been achieved so far, but much more needs to be done to avoid losing the ability to practise medicine and treat both common and serious illnesses."

[link url="http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2015/antibiotic-resistance-lacking/en/"]World Health Organisation material[/link]
[link url="http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2015/antibiotic-resistance-lacking/en/"]WHO 2014 report[/link]
[link url="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/163468/1/9789241564946_eng.pdf?ua=1&ua=1"]WHO 2015 report[/link]

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