"Drug-resistant infections are one of the biggest threats to the future of global health.”
-Dr.Mike Turner
Antibiotic overuse has undeniably been one of the pressing issues recently. Antibiotics are a type of antimicrobial that is used in treatments and in preventing infections from bacteria. Antibiotics kill germs inside your body to help cure infections. But we have been abusing this drug a long period of time, or to be exact, since 1940. We would be moving to “post-antibiotic era”, where the current medicine will not be effective enough for the body since we will all have developed resistance.The microbes will naturally develop a resistance towards medicines that we take. Dr.Charles Penn stated that: "Antimicrobial medicines are a very precious and valuable resource and something we cannot take for granted,” and "Public awareness of the issue is low in all regions, many people still believe antibiotics that kill bacteria will work for viruses such as the common cold or flu."
If the medicine stops working, we will develop infections such as tuberculosis, or a disease that affects lungs. Antibiotics are being overused in United States. The highest rate of antibiotic overuse is in the South and Appalachia. As results have shown, people in the south have more infections. To see how much antibiotics have been overused, doctors prescribed 258 million antibiotic regiments in 2010. One disease you can receive from antibiotic overuse is MRSA, or Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. MRSA is an infections that occurs in people who've been in hospitals or other health care facilities. About 2% of the population has the infection.
Currently, not every country has a solid plan.Out of 133 countries, only 34 countries have a national plan on how to handle antibiotics being overuse. However, the World Health Organization will meet about the issue and discuss a national plan for all countries to use.
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