<div dir="ltr">From: <b class="gmail_sendername">South Centre</b> <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:south@southcentre.int">south@southcentre.int</a>></span><br><div class="gmail_quote"><br></div><div class="gmail_quote"><b><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica neue,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:30px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)">World leaders urged to act on ‘post-antibiotic apocalypse’ by chief medical officer </span></span></span></b><br>
<br></div><div class="gmail_quote"><p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><b><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica neue,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:14px">Professor
Dame Sally Davies warns that resistance to treatments is a growing
threat that could mean ‘the end of modern medicine’. (excerpts)<br></span></span></span></b></p><p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><b><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica neue,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:14px"><br></span></span></span></b></p>
<b><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica neue,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:14px"> </span></span></span></b>
<b><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica neue,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:14px"></span></span></span></b></div><div class="gmail_quote"><p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">England’s
chief medical officer has warned of a “post-antibiotic apocalypse” as
she issued a call to action urging global leaders to address the growing
threat of antibiotic resistance.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Professor Dame Sally Davies said that if antibiotics lose their effectiveness it will spell “the end of modern medicine”.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Without
the drugs used to fight infections, common medical interventions such
as caesarean sections, cancer treatments and hip replacements would
become incredibly “risky”, she said.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">And transplant medicine would be a “thing of the past”, she added.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“We really are facing, if we don’t take action now, a dreadful post-antibiotic apocalypse,” she told the Press Association.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“I don’t want to say to my children that I didn’t do my best to protect them and their children.”</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Health experts have previously warned that resistance to antimicrobial drugs could cause a bigger threat to mankind than cancer.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">In
recent years, the UK has led a drive to raise global awareness of the
threat posed to modern medicine by antimicrobial resistance (AMR).</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Around
700,000 people around the world die annually due to drug-resistant
infections including tuberculosis (TB), HIV and malaria.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">If no action is taken, it has been estimated that drug-resistant infections will kill 10 million people a year by 2050.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Dame Sally said that because AMR is “hidden”, people “just let it pass”.</span></p><p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><br><span style="font-size:14px"><span style="font-size:14px">“This AMR is with us now, killing people.</span>
</span></p><p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“This is a serious issue that is with us now, causing deaths.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“If it was anything else people would be up in arms about it. But because it is hidden they just let it pass.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“It
does not really have a ‘face’ because most people who die of drug
resistant infections, their families just think they died of an
uncontrolled infection.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“It will only get worse unless we take strong action everywhere across the globe.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“We need some real work on the ground to make a difference or we risk the end of modern medicine.”</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">She
added: “Not to be able to effectively treat infections means that
caesarean sections, hip replacements, modern surgery, is risky.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“Modern cancer treatment is risky and transplant medicine becomes a thing of the past.”</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">Dame Sally warned that if the global community did not act then the progress which had been made in Britain may be “undermined”.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">She
added: “We use more than I would like and we estimate that about one in
three or one in four prescriptions in primary care are probably not
needed.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“But
other countries use vastly more antibiotics in the community and they
need to start doing as we are, which is reducing usage.</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">“Our latest data shows that we have reduced human consumption by 4.3 per cent in 2014/15 from the year before.”</span></p>
<p style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;line-height:150%;text-align:left"><span style="font-size:14px">In
September the World Health Organisation warned that antibiotics are
“running out” as a report found a “serious lack” of new drugs in the
development pipeline.</span><br></p></div></div>