You don’t know the active ingredient but you know the brand names like Flagyl and Septrin. You also know ampicillin, cloxacilin, tetracycline.
You buy them off the counter and pop them for any medical condition from a running stomach to cold. You might feel some relief or believe you do.
But have you noticed the drugs that seemed to work previously no longer worked quite as well the last time?
That’s antibiotic resistance—when bacteria that cause the diseases you treat become resistant to the antibiotics that once worked against them.
The World Health Organisation has warned antibiotic resistance is among the biggest threats to global health, food security and development.
The resistance is “decreasing the usefulness of modern medical technologies and jeopardizes both common and complex surgical procedures, while endangering animal health and welfare, as well as food production,” says Chikwe Ihekweazu, chief executive officer of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The centre has pushed a national action plan to deal with antimicrobial resistance.
“Most common antibiotics and even new ones are developing resistance,” says Joshua Obasanya, director of disease prevention and coordinator of antimicrobial resistance focal programme at the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
“We are going gradually into a difficult time.”
By nature, bacteria can develop resistance against antibiotics. Imagine flogging once a month; they start to anticipate it. But misuse of antibiotics in humans and animals accelerates the process. Think: flog someone every day, and they just might snap. More is not better.
The result is a growing number of infections from pneumonia and tuberculosis to gonorrhea and food poisoning are becoming harder to treat as the antibiotics used to treat them become less effective.
The result is also longer hospital stays, higher medical costs and increased mortality. By 2050, 10 million people could die each year from antimicrobial resistance if current trends continue, according to expert estimates last year.
All Sustainable Development Goals to do with health, cutting deaths and getting treatment could be hampered if antibiotics become useless against infections, experts say.
Remember the antibiotics you buy over the counter? Think also the various colour capsules hawked in motor parks and at junctions on the heads of young men. That’s part of the problem.
“The biggest resistance comes with the most easily accessible ones. The easier it is for you to get hold of, the more people will use and the quicker the resistance will grow,” says Ihekweazu.
You know that Septrin you buy for almost any infection. It has been so commonly used, it is almost ineffective.
The key to bringing antimicrobial resistance under check is finding a balance between access to antibiotics for people who need them and protecting antibiotics from misuse.
“Our first goal is to make sure people get the antibiotic that they need. That is access. But good access in Abuja and Lagos doesn’t mean people in rural areas have sufficient access,” says Ihekweazu.
“At the same time you have to protect the antibiotics from misuse. It is a careful balance, that’s why you need a health professional in-between; they will then manage where it is appropriate and where it isn’t.
“At the moment, we are focused on increasing access. Now that more access is being achieved, we have now to moderate the use to be sure to ensure the right medicines are given to the right people at the right amount for the right duration.”
The global health body recommends a few things individuals, communities and health workers can do to stop life-saving antibiotics becoming a problem.
• Test before you treat
• When given antibiotics, complete the dose
• The more you get vaccinated, the more you prevent diseases that require antibiotics.
