Government launches new plan to tackle antimicrobial resistance

The government has launched a National Action Plan to tackle antimicrobial resistance in a bid to protect the public from disease spread, severe illness, disability and death.

The National Action Plan aims to prevent antimicrobial resistance from spreading to ensure common infections and illnesses remain treatable.

Professor Susan Hopkins, Chief Medical Advisor at the UK Health Security Agency, said: “Antimicrobial resistance is a threat to all of us – simple lifesaving interventions in the form of antimicrobials are in danger of becoming ineffective.

“The UKHSA has risen to meet this active threat – but it will take collective action across government, industry, academia and the public to ensure that antimicrobials remain available for ourselves and our communities, now and in the future.”

8,000 people in the UK die from drug resistant infections every year

Antibiotics have made a major contribution to improving human health and life expectancy, with many infections that once killed people now treatable with antimicrobials.

However, some strains of bacteria have become resistant antibiotics, surviving and even multiplying even in the presence of powerful antimicrobials.

For example, staphylococcus aureus (‘golden staph’) and neisseria gonorrhoeae (the cause of gonorrhoea) were previously controlled by benzyl penicillin, but these bacteria are now resistant to the medication.

Rates of antimicrobial resistance are increasing across the world, and in 2019 alone, it is estimated that 1.27 million deaths were caused by drug resistant infections. In the UK, nearly 8,000 people die from such infections every year.

The scale of the antimicrobial resistance threat is well recognised by the World Health Organization and other international agencies and governments. These institutions have long been calling on health leaders to minimise the prescribing of antibiotics and good hygiene and infection control measures.

Government will support other countries to respond to threat of antimicrobial resistance

The government’s new five-year plan, which will run from 2024 to 2029, commits to:

• Reducing the use of antimicrobials (including antibiotics, antifungals and antivirals) to prevent infections from arising in the first place
• Monitoring the spread of antimicrobial resistance by strengthening the surveillance of drug resistant infections before they emerge
• Incentivising the industry to develop the next generation of treatments (e.g. vaccines, diagnostics and therapeutics) and minimise the release of antimicrobials into the environment.

In addition, the government says it will support low- and middle-income countries to respond to the threat of antimicrobial resistance through research, good supply chains and access to alternative treatments.

UK Special Envoy on AMR Dame Sally Davies said: “It is incomprehensible for any of us to imagine a world without effective antibiotics. But we are facing an antibiotic emergency already. And this menace is deeply unfair – with the burden disproportionately falling on the world’s most vulnerable, in low-and middle-income countries and also children.

“We have to work together, across the world, with those countries that need action the most, to make progress and contain AMR.

“Fantastic progress” in reducing antimicrobial resistance among animals

The plan follows on from the 2019 AMR programme which aimed to minimise the use of antibiotics in the medical and farming industries.

This programme reduced the use of antibiotics in food-producing animals by more than half, but James Anderson, Executive Director of Global Health at the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations says this work must now be reflected in the human population.

“Tackling the rising threat of antimicrobial resistance will depend on having a continuous pipeline that delivers new, innovative antibiotics. To do this, society needs to take bold action to redefine the value we place on them and attract more R&D investment.

“The successful results of the UK’s pilot programme provide an important reference point ahead of this year’s UN High-Level Meeting on AMR. As a truly global challenge, we need to see countries working together to make a step change in how the world is addressing AMR,” he said.