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Awareness of antibiotic resistance growing among European ophthalmologists, but old habits hard to eradicate

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The WHO has launched World Antibiotic Awareness Week, taking place Nov. 16 to 22. The aim of this new initiative is to increase awareness of the emerging global problem of antibiotic resistance and “to encourage best practices among the general public, health workers and policy makers,” the WHO said in a press release. World Antibiotic Awareness Week is part of a global action plan endorsed by the World Health Assembly in May, with the motto “Antibiotics: Handle with Care.”

“If we want to preserve the precious potential of antibiotics, which have saved millions of lives over the past 70 years, we must take care to use them responsibly and wisely,” Andrzej Grzybowski, MD, PhD, professor of ophthalmology at University of Warmia and Mazury and head of the department of ophthalmology at Poznan City Hospital, Poland, said.

Grzybowski is one of Europe’s first and strongest voices alerting to the dangers of antibiotic misuse and overuse in ophthalmology.

“We were educated to think that antibiotics are always good be- cause they kill microbes and bacteria, and for many years we have used them without being aware of the potential consequences of overuse or misuse. With resistance becoming a serious threat, we hould reconsider our practice patterns in ophthal- mology,” he said.

Antibiotic resistance is an increasing problem that leads to millions of deaths every year in all regions of the world. The WHO estimated that in the European Union alone, drug-resistant bacteria cause 25,000 deaths and cost more than US$1.5 billion every year in health care expenses and productivity losses.

In 1948, 38% of Staphylococcus aureus strains in one London hospital were found to be penicillin-resistant. Currently, more than 90% of strains in the U.K. and 100% in the U.S. are resistant to penicillin, while in some communities, more than 50% of strains are resistant to methicillin. In ophthalmology, antibiotic resistance to fluoroquinolones as well as to methicillin and oxacillin has steadily increased.

“Resistance to fourth-generation fluoroquinolones in the ocular surface flora has gone up from 2% in 2002 to 37% in 2010. Similarly, fluoroquinolone resistance among coagulase-negative Staphylococ- cus isolates causing endophthalmitis increased from 3.4% in 1994 to 34% 10 years later and reached 60% in 2011, the era of intravitreal injections,” Grzybowski said.

Click here to read the full publication exclusive, The Global Notebook, published in Ocular Surgery News Europe Edition, November/December 2015.