31.10.11
Lack of antibiotics in NHS
The NHS faces a “ticking time bomb” over the lack of modern antibiotics in the face of increasing resistance to infections, scientists and medical experts argue. They believe that urgent action is needed to accelerate the approved licensing process for new antibiotics.
Professor Laura Piddock, President of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (BSAC), said: “The magnitude of the crisis we face becomes apparent when we note that 16 new antibacterial agents were approved and brought to market between 1983-1987, compared with less than four agents between 2008-12.
“The dearth of new antibiotics reaching the marketplace today potentially threatens not only the management of ‘superbugs’, such as NDM 1 producing E. coli and multi-drug resistant gonorrhoea, but also the success of many routine treatments and procedures, from life-saving transplants and cancer chemotherapy, to joint replacements and therapies for cystic fibrosis sufferers.
“I fear there could be a return to a pre-antibiotic era where many people suffer or die from untreatable bacterial infections.”
The BSAC has launched a global initiative, called Antibiotic Action, which includes a petition to be presented to Downing Street on Wednesday November 9, signed by researchers, scientists and clinicians working in the NHS, as well as members of the public.
The petition calls on the Government to address opportunities to safely streamline and accelerate the licensing processes for new antibiotic agents, how to incentivise the commercial challenges faced by the industry in developing and bringing new antibiotics to the marketplace and develop initiatives that will encourage greater partnership working between pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies and academia in order to maximise the conversion of discovered candidate molecules into licensed antibiotics available for use on the NHS.
Tell us what you think – have your say below, or email us directly at [email protected]