WHO Antibiotic Resistance Data Shows Worrying Trend; Industry Ready To Help

Today, the World Health Organization released its first set of surveillance data on antibiotic resistance. The data shows that resistance to antibiotics is growing among the world’s most common bacteria, in both high- and low-income countries. Industry announced that it is in the process of making its surveillance data available.

The new WHO Global Antimicrobial Surveillance System (GLASS) released its report [pdf] (Early implementation 2016-17), which found that there is widespread antibiotic resistance among 500,000 people with suspected bacterial infections across 22 countries, according to a  press release.

Most commonly reported resistant bacteria were Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Staphylococcus aureus, and Streptococcus pneumoniae, followed by Salmonella spp.

“Resistance to penicillin – the medicine used for decades worldwide to treat pneumonia – ranged from zero to 51% among reporting countries,” the release said.

For this first report, 40 countries provided information about their national surveillance systems, and 22 countries provided data on levels of antibiotic resistance, the release said, also noting that data in the report “vary widely in quality and completeness.”

Some countries lack personnel, funds and infrastructure to build their national antimicrobial surveillance systems, it said, adding that the WHO is supporting countries to set up those systems, and standardise the way countries collect data.

Surveillance Data to be Shared by Industry

Meanwhile, an alliance of industries seeking to help curbing antimicrobial resistance announced today that many of its members are collecting surveillance data on antibiotic resistance, and plan to share them openly.

The AMR [Antimicrobial resistance] Industry Alliance said today in a statement [pdf] that many alliance members are collecting surveillance data to better understand incidence rates of resistance to various antibiotics. Those companies, the AMR Industry Alliance said, are “currently, or planning to, openly share their surveillance data externally.”

According to the statement, surveillance data is essential to help make better informed decisions when treating patients. Those data are shared with public health bodies and healthcare professionals, it says.

Companies collect a range of data including pathogen incidence, pathogen resistance profiles, and product consumption/use, from all regions of the world. Some surveillance programmes, the release said, have been running for more than 16 years.

“’Know your enemy’ are the watch words” in the case of antimicrobial resistance, Thomas Cueni, chair of the AMR Industry Alliance, said in the statement.

The statement says that the alliance supports GLASS and calls for more collaboration and analysis across the datasets. “The Alliance is open to collaborating with the WHO, member states and other stakeholders to strengthen surveillance capabilities, in particular in low resource settings,” it said.

 

Image Credits: World Health Organization