STAT+: Lack of access to antibiotics for drug-resistant infections often blamed on poor care, study says
Only 6.9% of people with drug-resistant infections in eight large, low- and middle-income countries received an appropriate antibiotic over a one-year period studied in a new analysis.
Only 6.9% of people with drug-resistant infections in eight large, low- and middle-income countries received an appropriate antibiotic in 2019 and the lack of access was largely attributed to insufficient care, according to a new analysis.
The researchers examined several antibiotics that were suitable to treat nearly 1.5 million cases of carbapenem-resistant gram-negative infections, which are highly resistant to drugs, in geographically diverse countries — Bangladesh, Brazil, Egypt, India, Kenya, Mexico, Pakistan, and South Africa. But availability was low in each country, ranging from 0.2% to 14.9%.
The findings, which were published in The Lancet, underscored potentially significant gaps in care that may otherwise have made it possible to access the available antibiotics, according to Jennifer Cohn, a senior author of the study and the global access director at the Global Antibiotic Research & Development Partnership, a nonprofit health organization.
