Scientific Asia. A recent study estimates that by 2050, the number of deaths globally attributed to illnesses resistant to the drugs used to treat them may rise by about 70%, underscoring the severity of the growing superbug epidemic.
Antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, may be directly responsible for almost 39 million deaths worldwide between 2025 and 2050, according to a study published on Monday in the journal The Lancet.
Antimicrobial resistance occurs when bacteria, fungi, and other pathogens learn to resist the drugs meant to eradicate them.
AMR is “one of the top global public health and development threats,” according to the World Health Organization. It is caused by the overuse and misuse of antibiotics in people, animals, and plants, which can lead to bacteria becoming resistant to them.
The head of the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation and lead author of the new study, Dr. Chris Murray, stated that “we expect it to get worse” in terms of the prevalence of AMR and its impacts.
“To address what is quite a large problem, we need to give new antibiotics and antibiotic stewardship the appropriate attention,” he stated.
The burden falls on older adults.
The researchers estimated the number of deaths and illnesses linked to antimicrobial resistance versus those caused by it for 22 pathogens, 84 pathogen-drug combinations, and 11 infections across 204 countries and territories between 1990 and 2021. They were from the Global Research on Antimicrobial Resistance Project, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, and other institutions.
A mortality linked to antimicrobial resistance (AMR) may have had a secondary cause that the antimicrobial resistance amplified, whereas a death attributable to AMR was caused directly by the antimicrobial resistance.
Approximately 520 million distinct records comprised the dataset used to generate those estimations.
The study’s findings show that between 1990 and 2021, mortality from antimicrobial resistance (AMR) decreased by over 50% in children under the age of five but increased by over 80% in people 70 years of age and above. These patterns are expected to persist.
Murray claimed that the patterns that appeared were unexpected.
The decrease in AMR mortality among people under the age of 15 was mostly brought about by immunization, water and sanitation initiatives, some treatment programs, and their effectiveness, according to Murray.
He stated that as the world ages, older people may become more vulnerable to serious infections. “And at the same time, there’s this steady increase in the number of deaths over age 50.”
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, was the pathogen-drug combination that had the biggest increase in causing the most burden across all age categories, according to the report. The number of deaths attributable to this combination—the bacteria S. aureus and the antibiotic methicillin—nearly doubled from 57,200 in 1990 to 130,000 in 2021.
Through statistical modeling, the researchers also generated projections for the number of deaths and illnesses linked to antimicrobial resistance (AMR) by 2050 under three different scenarios: the continuation of the current climate, the development of new, powerful antibiotics to target resistant pathogens, and the improvement of infection care and antibiotic accessibility globally.
Antimicrobial resistance-related mortality is expected to rise by 2050 if action is not taken to promote access to high-quality healthcare, potent medicines, and other resources for the prevention and treatment of diseases.
According to the researchers’ estimates, 8.2 million fatalities worldwide could be linked to antibiotic resistance by 2050, and 1.9 million deaths could be directly caused by it.
South Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa are the regions of the world most affected by antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and deaths related to it, according to the statistics. Many of these regions lack fair access to high-quality healthcare, according to Murray.
“Unfortunately, a significant portion of the problem still stems from the fact that in many low-resource settings, people who require antibiotics simply do not obtain them. But it’s not just the antibiotics. It’s when you are sick as an adult or child and are admitted to the hospital that you receive a package of care that includes supplies like oxygen, according to Murray.
In circumstances with few resources, fundamental necessities like oxygen are frequently unavailable. Furthermore, in many low-resource countries—the majority of them, in fact—you wouldn’t have access to that kind of care if you were extremely ill and in need of an intensive care unit. “There is a range of supportive care along with antibiotics that truly help.”
However, the researchers predict that 92 million fatalities might be prevented globally between 2025 and 2050 if healthcare standards are improved. And almost 11 million fatalities may be prevented if new, more powerful medications were available worldwide.
“There may be hope shortly.”
This study’s “innovative and collaborative” methodology offers a “comprehensive assessment” of antibiotic resistance and its possible global burden. The Kenya Medical Research Institute’s Samuel Kariuki provided a commentary to go along with the recently published report in The Lancet.
However, he cautioned that the forecast models “may lead to underestimation if new pathogens arise” because they do not account for the introduction of new superbugs.
All things considered, according to Kariuki, “these facts should drive investments and targeted action” toward resolving the escalating problem of antibiotic resistance in all parts of the world.
Dr. Steffanie Strathdee, assistant dean of global health sciences and distinguished professor at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study, stated that the new publication represents decades of research on the worldwide impact of antimicrobial resistance.
Strathdee’s husband almost passed away from a superbug illness, allowing her to witness directly the consequences that antibiotic resistance can have on health.
“I’ve spent the last eight years dealing with the effects of antibiotic resistance on my family. An illness from a superbug almost killed my husband. As co-director of the Center for Innovative Phage Applications and Therapeutics at UC San Diego, Strathdee stated, “It’s one of the infections that’s highlighted in this paper.”
2015 saw Strathdee’s husband, Tom Patterson, go on a Thanksgiving cruise on the Nile when he suddenly started experiencing terrible stomach problems. Patterson was sent to Germany when a facility in Egypt was unable to treat his deteriorating symptoms. There, medical professionals found a grapefruit-sized abdominal abscess containing the aggressive bacteria Acinetobacter baumannii, which is resistant to almost all medications.
According to a new study, the annual number of deaths from carbapenem-resistant gram-negative bacteria, such as A. baumannii, which are used as last-resort antibiotics to treat severe bacterial infections, increased by 89,200 between 1990 and 2021, more than any other antibiotic class.
One of these gram-negative bacteria is one of the urgent priority pathogens, according to Strathdee. “And my husband was 69 years old when he became ill from this.” Therefore, he is precisely the age at which this research highlights how older people will be more impacted by this in the future due to the aging of our population and the prevalence of comorbidities like diabetes, which my husband also has.
Following treatment with phages—virals that specifically target and eradicate bacteria—Strathdee’s spouse made a full recovery. Phage therapy is a therapeutic option for bacterial infections resistant to antibiotics.
According to Strathdee, “phage therapy, also known as bacteriophage therapy, is the most important alternative to antibiotics and is what saved my husband’s life.” “Phage can be used in conjunction with antibiotics very effectively to lower the dosage required, and they may even be used in farming and livestock applications.”
Strathdee is encouraged by the new study’s findings that the global burden of antibiotic resistance may be lessened. That would necessitate lowering the use of antibiotics in livestock, food production, and the environment, which can breed more resistance while increasing access to antibiotics and newer antimicrobial treatments, vaccinations, clean water, and other parts of high-quality health care globally, she said.
According to Strathdee, “hope may be in the air.” “The number of deaths in the future could be drastically decreased if we were to scale up these interventions.”
