The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned of a sharp rise in antimicrobial resistance (AMR), with one in six bacterial infections worldwide now resistant to antibiotic treatments.
WHO’s latest global surveillance report found that antibiotic resistance rose in over 40% of the pathogen-antibiotic combinations monitored from 2018 to 2023, with an average annual increase of 5-15% depending on the combination.1
The problem was most severe in low and middle income countries and in those with weaker healthcare systems, with resistance present in a third of all infections in some regions.
In 2019 WHO estimated that 1.27 million deaths worldwide were caused by antibiotic resistant infections. It forecasts that this will rise to 10 million …
