World leaders to commit £606mnto fight superbugs in new UN declaration
All 193 United Nations (UN) member states have agreed to sign a groundbreaking declaration and pledge £606 million (US$790 million) in the fight against what has been said to be the world’s biggest health threat, the antibiotic-resistant “superbugs”.
The pledge follows a UK-led drive to raise awareness of the potential impact of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which England’s chief medical officer Professor Dame Sally Davies described as “the greatest future threat to our civilization”.
Professor Davies also said the declaration was the culmination of six years of hard work. “Drug-resistant infections are firmly on the global agenda, but now the real work begins. We need governments, the pharmaceutical industry, health professionals and the agricultural sector to follow through on their commitments to save modern medicine.”
Every signatory of the UN declaration will agree to:
- Develop surveillance and regulatory systems on the use and sales of antimicrobial medicines for humans and animals
- Encourage innovative ways to develop new antibiotics
- Educate health professionals and raise public awareness on how to prevent drug-resistant infections
The special meeting that was held was only the fourth time in the UN’s 70-year history that the general assembly has met to specifically discuss a health issue.
Serious concerns have been raised by health leaders from around the world regarding the increasing resistance to antimicrobial drugs, which destroy harmful microbes. Antibiotics are the best known of these drugs, among others such as antivirals, antimalarial drugs and antifungals.
An estimated 700,000 people die globally every year due to drug-resistant infections such as TB, HIV and malaria. If no action is taken, it has been estimated that drug-resistant infections will kill 10 million people a year by 2050.
If antibiotics lose their effectiveness then key medical procedures including gut surgery, caesarean sections, joint replacements and chemotherapy could become too dangerous to perform.
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