Antibiotic crisis 'bigger than Aids epidemic'

The report warned that the crisis is bigger and more urgent than the Aids epidemic of the Eighties. Photo / Thinkstock

Common infections and minor scratches could soon kill because antibiotics are becoming useless against new superbugs, the World Health Organisation has warned.

A child's scratched knee from falling off their bike, common bladder infections among the elderly in care homes and routine surgery to replace broken hips could all become fatal, the WHO said.

The report also warned that the crisis is bigger and more urgent than the Aids epidemic of the Eighties.

UK experts said the "era of safe medicine is coming to an end" and government funds must be pumped into the production of new drugs.

In the foreword to the report Dr Keiji Fukuda, WHO's Assistant Director-General for Health Security, wrote: "A post-antibiotic era, in which common infections and minor injuries can kill, far from being an apocalyptic fantasy, is instead a very real possibility for the 21st century."

He said: "Unless we take significant actions to improve efforts to prevent infections and also change how we produce, prescribe and use antibiotics, the world will lose more and more of these global public health goods and the implications will be devastating."

He said modern medicine, from treatment of urinary tract infections and pneumonia in babies to chemotherapy and kidney dialysis, was under threat. "This is not an abstract problem. We have a big problem now and it is going to get bigger. What do we do when we have infections we cannot treat or when we lose the ability to protect people when having chemotherapy? I think there are very concrete implications,'' he said.

Dr Danilo Lo Fo Wong, Senior Adviser for Antimicrobial Resistance at WHO Europe, told The Daily Telegraph: "A child falling off their bike and developing a fatal infection would be a freak occurrence in the UK but that is where we are heading.

"Antibiotic resistance travels with infectious diseases and infectious diseases travel around the world.''

Lord Darzi, the surgeon and former health minister, described the situation as a "global threat" but warned little is being done to tackle it.

Writing for telegraph.co.uk, he said: "The rapidly evolving resistance is turning common infections into untreatable diseases.

"The world is entering an era where a child's scratched knee could kill, where patients entering hospital gamble with their lives and routine operations are too dangerous to carry out.

"Every antibiotic ever developed is at risk of becoming useless. The age of safe medicine is ending."

Prof Laura Piddock, Director of Antibiotic Action and Professor of Microbiology at the University of Birmingham said: "The world needs to respond as it did to the Aids crisis of the Eighties."

She said governments need to pump money into developing new drugs and added that UK funding on antibiotic research has dropped to less than one per cent of available research funds.

Dr Lo Fo Wong said antibiotic resistance was bigger than the Aids crisis because "everyone is potentially in danger".

Dr Paul Cosford, Director for Health Protection and Medical Director at Public Health England, said: "Whilst the UK does not have the levels of antibiotic resistance seen in some parts of the world we do see patients with infections resistant to antibiotics and we take these very seriously."