2015 AAAS Annual Meeting (12-16 February 2015)

February 12 - 16, 2015

Bugs Without Borders: A Data-Driven Approach to Tackling Antimicrobial Resistance

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a global threat that has been referred to in the same terms as that posed by terrorism and climate change. A total of 50,000 people die from sepsis every year in the European Union and the United States. In Southeast Asia, one young child dies every five minutes because of AMR. The ability for doctors to prescribe antibiotics to combat infection has been part of modern medicine since Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928. However, widespread, and sometimes unregulated, use of antibiotics creates massive selective evolutionary pressure on microbes to develop resistance to each new class of drug deployed. Throughout most of the 20th century, new drugs were discovered that could be used as resistance to old drugs developed. But now the cupboard is bare. Not a single new class of antibiotic has been discovered since 1987. The problem spans beyond medical practice because antibiotics used in agriculture as a substitute for hygiene contributes to the problem, since resistance genes are easily transferred between bacterial species within microbial communities. AMR is as much a public policy problem as a medical problem, and the key to solving it is information. Data on prescription practices and surveillance are vital in fighting AMR, as are genomic data being mined in search of novel genes and other information that could provide new antimicrobials. The problem is an international one: bugs know no borders and coordinated approaches across borders will provide the ammunition to fight the war on AMR.