Global strategies are urgently needed to reduce antibiotic use in animals and agriculture, say researchers from Imperial College London.
In a paper published today in medical journal The Lancet, the authors argue that excessive use of the medication in animals is contributing as much to the global antibiotic resistance crisis as overuse in humans.
The majority of antibiotics produced by pharmaceutical companies are used in animals rather than humans and there have been outbreaks of antibiotic resistant bacteria in hospitals that have been traced back to bacteria from animals. Although antibiotic use in animals in Europe is tightly regulated, it is less controlled in other parts of the world.
The world is on the cusp of a “post-antibiotic era”, scientists have warned after finding bacteria resistant to drugs used when all other treatments have failed.
They identified bacteria able to shrug off the drug of last resort – colistin – in patients and livestock in China.
They said that resistance would spread around the world and raised the spectre of untreatable infections.
It is likely resistance emerged after colistin was overused in farm animals.
Bacteria becoming completely resistant to treatment – also known as the antibiotic apocalypse – could plunge medicine back into the dark ages.
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