China can help stop misuse of antibiotics

For around 90 years, antibiotics have been the go-to medicine for many illnesses. However, their systematic misuse and overuse in human medicine and food production is making bacteria increasingly resistant to their effects. Resistance is also growing to drugs commonly used to combat viruses, fungi and other parasites. This phenomenon is called antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

Imagine common surgical procedures such as a caesarean section, or a simple bout of pneumonia suddenly becoming life threatening because we can't fight infections with antibiotics or other antimicrobial drugs - that's the situation we face if we don't act on AMR now.

Unless immediate action on a global scale is taken, the world is heading toward a post-antibiotic era in which common infections could once again kill. Resistance to antibiotics could be responsible for killing 10 million people every year across the world over the next 30 years. That's the equivalent to one person every 3 seconds - which is more deaths than cancer causes today. The impact on national economies will be equally staggering: during the same time frame, without action to tackle AMR, the global cumulative economic cost is projected to reach about $100 trillion.