Indians ‘addicted’ to antibiotics? Six-Fold Rise In Usage Ups Fear Of Resistance

New Delhi: There has been a six-fold increase in the number of antibiotics being popped by Indians. This includes the retail sale of Carbapenems — powerful Class IV antibiotics, typically used as a "last resort" to treat serious infections caused by multi-drug resistant, gram-negative pathogens. 

    Research by the Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, Washington DC, has found that retail sale of carbapenems increased six times — from 0.21 units per million in 2005 to 1.23 in 2010, raising serious fears of resistance to these drugs. 
    The Centre said that based on pharmaceutical audit data from IMSHealth's Multinational Integrated Data Analysis System (MIDAS), the size of the carbapenem retail market in India was $27.4 million (Rs 119.4 crore) in 2010, which is actually a small share of the $1.7 billion (Rs 7,953 crore) anti-infectives market, and $10 billion (Rs 46,787 crore) total pharmaceutical market. 
    India consumes fewer carbapenems per capita than Pakistan. In 2010, a total of 1,753,740 units of carbapenem antibiotics — usually dispensed in 1g vials — were retailed in pharmacies throughout India and Pakistan (1,457,246 and 196,494 in each, respectively). When adjusted for population, Indian per capita consumption in 2010 was 27% lower than that of Pakistan: 1.25 units per million population versus 1.7. 
    CDDEP research analyst Nikolay Braykov told TOI from Washington, "Indian carbapenem consumption grew at more than twice the pace of Pakistan between 2005 and 2010 — there was nearly a six-fold increase. In Pakistan, the same market grew 2.5 times, from 0.68 to 1.7 units per million population. The data covers the retail pharmacy channels, estimated to account for 80% of the pharmaceutical market in both India and Pakistan." 
    The health ministry too has been worried about India's overuse of antibiotics. India had made plans to ban the availability and over-the-counter sale of the latest generation of antibiotics from general pharmacies in a bid to end the country's obsession with popping pills. However the plans were shelved. Even director of Centres for Disease Control Atlanta chief Dr Thomas R Frieden, who was recently in India, told the TOI in an exclusive interview that drug resistance due to irrational use of antibiotics will rise in future. The World Health Organizatio has also warned that the world is staring at a post-antibiotic era, when common infections will no longer have a cure. 
DISTURBING TREND 
    The sale of Carbapenems — a powerful class IV antibiotics, used as a 'last resort' to treat serious infections caused by multi-drug resistant, gramnegative pathogens has risen six times between 2005 and 2010 in India 
    This has raised serious fears of resistance to these drugs. Even the WorldHealth Organization has warned that the world is staring at a post-antibiotic era, when common infections will no longer have a cure