Rising Antimicrobial Resistance Is Leading To A Cureless India
Karnataka Today|February 2017

Antimicrobial resistance happens when microorganisms (such as bacteria, fungi, viruses, and parasites) change when they are exposed to antimicrobial drugs (such as antibiotics, antifungals, antivirals, antimalarials, and anthelmintics). Microorganisms that develop antimicrobial resistance are sometimes referred to as “superbugs”. As a result, the medicines become ineffective and infections persist in the body, increasing the risk of spread to others. It’s a serious threat to public health in India and requires action across all government sectors and society. Without effective antibiotics, the success of major surgery and cancer chemotherapy would be compromised. Also the cost of health care for patients with resistant infections is higher than care for patients with non-resistant infections due to longer duration of illness, additional tests and use of more expensive drugs. Raina Paul explores this growing menace in Indian society…

Raina Paul
Rising Antimicrobial Resistance Is Leading To A Cureless India

The absence of a mechanism to regulate sales of antibiotics is gradually making them impotent, with harmful pathogens adapting to them and learning to thrive in the human body. Experts believe bacteria are building resistance to even increased dosages of antibiotics. Speaking about the dangers of antibiotic resistance, Dr Maneesh Paul, head of academic research at St. Martha’s Hospital, Bengaluru, said that we are now entering a pre-antibiotic era, which is equal to the nonexistence of antibiotics.

In Karnataka, as all over the country, antibiotics can be bought over the counter without a doctor’s prescription. Diseases like pneumonia, tuberculosis, blood poisoning and gonorrhoea are becoming harder, sometimes impossible, to treat as the antibiotics used to treat them are becoming ineffective. Even in surgery rooms where infections are most likely to occur, doctors struggle to find an alternative as antibiotics have almost become defunct.

“Bacteria are resistant to even the highest level of antibiotics called Carbapenem, which are used in intensive care units and administered to critically-ill patients. This is scary. I don’t think any politician or policy maker understands this unless it hits them at home,” said Dr Paul, who is also chief scientific officer at St. Martha’s.

According to reports, Carbapenem-resistance among K. Pneumoniae increased from 2% in 2002 to 52% in 2009 in one tertiary-care hospital in New Delhi. The Ministry of Health & Family Welfare (MHAFW) in mid-2016 admitted to the existence of antimicrobial resistance in India and was concerned about its increasing incidence. A large number of studies conducted at various locations in India by ICMR and other health institutions from 2005 onward found the presence of antimicrobial resistance in the country.

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