Global glut in antibiotics fuelling superbugs
DRUG-RESISTANT superbugs are rising in the UK because of the lack of regulation of antibiotics in developing countries, experts have warned.
One of the biggest studies of antibiotic use around the world has established that while consumption has slowed in Britain, global use jumped by 65 per cent, to 34.8billion daily doses between 2000 and 2015.
The analysis, led by the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy (CDDEP) in Washington DC, found the rise was being driven by skyrocketing use in low- to middle-income countries such as India, China and Turkey where consumption was up by 114 per cent.
Resistant infections already kill an estimated 5,000 people in Britain each year and global deaths are projected to grow to 10 million a year by 2030 – one every three seconds – unless urgent action is taken, experts fear.
The news comes as an investigation by The Daily Telegraph into the sale of antibiotics in India found:
♦ Pharmaceutical companies, including Abbott, Pfizer and Glaxosmith- Kline (GSK), have fuelled the crisis by marketing antibiotics in India that were unapproved elsewhere.
♦ Many companies continue to pay sales teams bonuses for volume sales, despite international calls to desist.
♦ Failures in Indian regulation, with antibiotics given macho marketing names – like Fighttox and Megamycin – and made widely available without adequate controls or prescriptions
♦ Resistant superbugs being brought back to UK through travel and tourism
leading to hundreds of new cases in UK hospitals.
The disclosures are likely to fuel fears about how common infections could become untreatable.
In the latest study, published yesterday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the authors called for urgent action to better control antibiotic use around the world.
“As with climate change, there may be an unknown tipping point, and this could herald a future without effective antibiotics”, they said.
A study published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology found nearly two thirds of fixed-dose combination (FDC) antibiotics sold in India had no regulatory approval.
The use of FDCS, which comprise two or more drugs in a fixed ratio, are only rarely approved in developed countries as they can be harmful and are more likely to spread resistance.
The study found that 53 FDCS manufactured by multinationals and sold in India between 2007 and 2012 were not approved in India, and only four were approved in the US and UK. The multinationals involved included Abbott, Pfizer and Glaxosmithkline.
Abbott said that the products listed in the study were medicines they acquired in 2010 and many were no longer sold in India. They said that “medicines still available in India all have proper approvals in place”.
A Pfizer spokesman said that “all our current formulations marketed in India have the applicable regulatory licences and approvals”. They said that they were one of four firms who had “moved to decouple antibiotic sales volumes from sales agents’ bonuses”. Glaxo did not respond to questions.