Research conducted by the University of KwaZulu-Natal and Nesta Challenges shows a rapid increase in reliance on last resort antibiotics.
The research also found a rise in drug resistant infections.
A last resort antibiotic is used to treat infections with bacteria that are resistant against the common antibiotics.
Daniel Berman, a director at Global health at Nesta Challenges, says the premise of the research was to find a better diagnostic tool to use antibiotics.
“So, we were looking at resistance in antibiotics, we looked at klebsiella pneumonia, very serious type of pneumonia. You can only imagine if you have a serious pneumonia in your lungs and the antibiotics that you’re given the first time don’t work or the second time. So, what we found was that there were two antibiotics, and the level of resistance has gone up 200% in one case and 300% in over five years.”
Berman provides more clarity:
