Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his monthly radio address Mann Ki Baat, warned about the growing threat of antimicrobial resistance quoting a recent report by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) which showed how antibiotics are proving ineffective against many diseases like pneumonia and UTI (urinary tract infection). He pointed to the indiscriminate use of antibiotics behind the health crisis and urged people not to take them mindlessly or do so strictly on advice of the doctor.
Health experts have hailed PM Modi’s timely warning about the emerging crisis. Dr Devi Shetty, Indian cardiac surgeon, Chairman and founder of Narayana Health, in an interview with New Arena India, explained why people should refrain from taking antibiotics without prescription and how if not tackled this could take us back to pre-penicillin era, where “virtually every patient died following an operation because of the sepsis.”
Dr Shetty explains that antibiotic resistance simply just means that “when you develop a serious infection, none of the antibiotics would be able to treat your problem.”
How antibiotic use has increased in the last decade
The renowned cardiac surgeon who has been performing heart surgeries in India for the last 36 years talked about the dramatic increase in infections fuelled by antibiotic abuse.
Talking about earlies times, the expert said there were hardly any infections and antibiotics were given just for two days after a heart surgery.
“I have been practicing heart surgery in India for the last 36 years. First 15 years, it was best period of time. After any heart operation, however major it was, patients had antibiotics for just two days and then we stopped the antibiotics. If the patient’s condition deteriorated after the surgery, sepsis or infection was never a thought we had in our mind. because infection just wasn’t there,” he said in the interview.
In the last ten years, Dr Shetty says things have changed dramatically and infection is feared in case of complex heart surgery or any surgery, necessitating the use of antibiotics.
“The problem is, infection can happen, but most of the common antibiotics we use today they just simply do not kill the bacteria,” he says.
The antibiotics aren’t doing their job because of their rampant abuse over a period of time as people take them even not minor things like cold, cough, or mild fever. He added that the bacteria have become too familiar with the antibiotics so much so that they don’t work anymore.
Billions of dollars cost involved in new antibiotic
The cardiac surgeon says new antibiotics involve time and cost and still there is no guarantee that the bacteria won’t become resistant.
“Firstly for last, there hasn’t been a single new antibiotic because it takes billions of dollars to produce an antibiotic to kill the bacteria. And even we come up with a new medicine, the way we are consuming antibiotic, in no time that bacteria can become resistant,” the doctor says.
‘Don’t demand antibiotics from your doctor’
Dr Shetty says the solution lies with the people taking them. He urges people not to “demand” antibiotic from doctors, and take them only if they prescribe.
“Refrain from taking antibiotics without doctor’s prescription. And never demand with the doctor, you want an antibiotic. If the doctor feels you need antibiotics, they will give you, but you don’t insist on it,” he says.
Deadly future ahead
Painting a scary picture of the future where at the peak of antimicrobial resistance, medicines would stop working, Dr Shetty said that will take us back to the pre-penicillin era where almost all patients died post an operation due to a possible infection.
“If you don’t believe me, in the near future, we will run out of all the antibiotics, and we will go back to the pre-penicillin era that was before penicillin was invented. Virtually every patient died following an operation because of the sepsis, because of the infection. We are growing in that direction. So my request to all of you is if it is possible always avoid taking the antibiotic and never take antibiotic without doctor prescription,” he signs off.
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