Citation and selected extracts below. Read online: https://www.bmj.com/content/376/bmj.o596
CITATION: Pandemic panic and indiscriminate prescriptions drive India’s antimicrobial resistance
BMJ 2022; 376 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.o596 (Published 08 March 2022)
Cite this as: BMJ 2022;376:o596
Indiscriminate prescriptions during the pandemic are accelerating the crisis of antimicrobial resistance in a country that already had the world’s largest consumption of antibiotics, reports Kamala Thiagarajan...
Before the pandemic, studies showed that incorrect use of antibiotics for colds and coughs was common in India owing to a combination of cheap prices, doctors overprescribing, and easy non-prescription availability over the counter, with the highest number being taken by children in the age group 0-4 years. That trend, combined with confusion over covid-19, fuelled even more prescriptions in the outpatient setting...
Antimicrobial resistant superbugs, resilient to various drugs, have been increasingly detected in hospital settings in India, particularly in intensive care units, where the sickest patients, including covid-19 patients, are treated. Studies show that it’s a growing threat to newborns, accounting for increased sepsis or blood poisoning infections and high mortality rates...
The reserve group is the last resort: these are powerful drugs to treat superbugs or other highly antibiotic resistant infections and they should be limited to tertiary care centres. However, because of a lack of awareness, even among medical practitioners, frequent prescriptions of drugs that are in the watch and reserve category are common in India. The pandemic has made the situation worse.
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Neil Pakenham-Walsh, HIFA Coordinator, neil@hifa.org www.hifa.org
