Due to the accumulation of antibiotic residues… health risks revealed by a “change”.

02:00

Wednesday, January 18, 2023

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Scientists have warned that effluents and sewage treatment plants in Asia represent regional hotspots of growing health risks from growing disease resistance to antibiotics, both locally and globally.

Studies indicate that this problem is greatly exacerbated, with the accumulation of antibiotic residues in the water of emerging countries such as India, China and its neighbors.

Thomas Van Boekel, Professor of Health Geography at the University of Gothenburg, Germany, says: “Collecting data helps to get an idea of ​​the existence of concentrations of a wide variety of antibiotics in different masses of water from the Asian continent, and the answer to this question is /yes/.”

Experts speak of antibiotic resistance when the patient’s body does not respond to a particular antibiotic, that is, when the antibiotic does not eliminate the bacteria that cause a particular disease.

Van Boekel believes that antibiotic resistance in China or India, for example, also affects Europe, and he explains: “Many studies show that many pathogens that have developed drug resistance are spreading around the world.

And antibiotics reach rivers, lakes, oceans and groundwater from sewage from residential areas, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies, as humans and animals who receive treatment with such drugs excrete appreciable proportions. of these substances in a biologically effective form in urine and faeces.

And in the regions classified by the World Health Organization as the “West Pacific region”, which includes China, and the “Southeast Asia region”, which includes India, almost 90% of liquid waste enters the human body without treatment, according to a recent study presented by the scientific journal The Lancet Planetary Health. .

Studies indicate that China and India are among the largest producers and consumers of antibiotics in the world, but body resistance to these drugs has now become one of the most common causes of death worldwide. .

As antibiotic residues accumulate in the environment, the risk of the emergence of more drug-resistant pathogens or the emergence of new resistance pathways also increases. Different species of bacteria can transmit drug resistance mechanisms to each other, and thus resistant pathogens infiltrate the bodies of humans and animals, increasing the incidence of infections that cannot be successfully treated.

The problem is exacerbated in countries in the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia, as many people directly use water from rivers and lakes for washing and drinking, according to a study by a team of researchers from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, led by researcher Nada Hana.

The research team evaluated 240 analytical studies of the situation in the countries of the two regions by measuring the quantities of water polluted by liquid waste and determining the water flows inside and outside the stations purification. It has been confirmed by studies that these stations represent major hotbeds of antibiotic resistance, as 92 different types of antibiotics for humans and animals have been monitored in the Western Pacific region and 45 species in Asian countries. from the South East.

According to the research group, the highest risk of antibiotic resistance in drinking water comes from the type of antibiotic “ciprofloxacin”, which is commonly used in China and other countries in the Western Pacific region. However, in many countries in both regions, there is still a lack of data on antibiotic levels in the environment, warns the study team.

Avoiding the misuse and unnecessary use of antibiotics is an important measure to combat the spread of antibiotic resistance, and studies have repeatedly shown that antibiotic use is often tolerated in emerging countries. According to a survey published by the scientific journal Antimicrobial Resistance and Infection Control in 2020, it was found that it was possible to buy antibiotics without a prescription in the year 2019 in more than 80% of the 1,100 pharmacies surveyed.

And 25% of these pharmacies dispensed antibiotics for limited symptoms of respiratory disease, and half of the antibiotics needed were sold after patients asked for them by name.

According to estimates by the World Health Organization, around 1.3 million people die each year due to the ineffectiveness of antibiotics in treating infections they have had. EU health authorities also report that by the end of 2022, more than 35,000 people will die each year from antibiotic resistance in the European Economic Area.

In the scientific journal Science Translational Medicine, researchers Michael Cook and Gerard Wright of the University of Macalester in Canada warned last year against approaching the “post-antibiotic era”, which means that it will no longer be possible to treat certain forms of infections that were usually treated with medication. reached in the twentieth century.