TY - JOUR
T1 - The need for new antibiotics
AU - Livermore, David
N1 - Copyright:
Copyright 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2004/11
Y1 - 2004/11
N2 - Politicians and public health officials have joined specialist professionals in recognising antibiotic resistance as a threat to modern medicine. Their response has centred on minimising unnecessary antibiotic prescribing, aiming to reduce selection pressure for resistance. Despite a few hopeful trends (e.g., declining penicillin resistance among pneumococci in the UK), established resistance is proving hard to displace; moreover, new resistances continue to emerge and to proliferate at new sites. There consequently remains a strong need for new antibiotics, particularly those directed against multiresistant Gram-negative bacteria in hospitals. Already some nonfermenters of the genera Acinetobacter and Pseudomonas are resistant to all good antibiotics and many Enterobacteriaceae are resistant to all except carbapenems. There is also a growing need for new agents against community-acquired pathogens, including the agents of tuberculosis, gonorrhoea and urinary tract infections. Unless antibacterial development is re-energised, there is a serious risk that a growing proportion of infections, especially in hospitals, will become effectively untreatable.
AB - Politicians and public health officials have joined specialist professionals in recognising antibiotic resistance as a threat to modern medicine. Their response has centred on minimising unnecessary antibiotic prescribing, aiming to reduce selection pressure for resistance. Despite a few hopeful trends (e.g., declining penicillin resistance among pneumococci in the UK), established resistance is proving hard to displace; moreover, new resistances continue to emerge and to proliferate at new sites. There consequently remains a strong need for new antibiotics, particularly those directed against multiresistant Gram-negative bacteria in hospitals. Already some nonfermenters of the genera Acinetobacter and Pseudomonas are resistant to all good antibiotics and many Enterobacteriaceae are resistant to all except carbapenems. There is also a growing need for new agents against community-acquired pathogens, including the agents of tuberculosis, gonorrhoea and urinary tract infections. Unless antibacterial development is re-energised, there is a serious risk that a growing proportion of infections, especially in hospitals, will become effectively untreatable.
KW - Antibiotics
KW - Multiresistance
KW - Pharmaceutical development
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=16644364407&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1111/j.1465-0691.2004.1004.x
DO - 10.1111/j.1465-0691.2004.1004.x
M3 - Article
C2 - 15522034
AN - SCOPUS:16644364407
SN - 1470-9465
VL - 10
SP - 1
EP - 9
JO - Clinical Microbiology and Infection, Supplement
JF - Clinical Microbiology and Infection, Supplement
IS - 4
ER -