Antimicrobial Resistance Linked to 3 Million Pediatric Deaths in 2022, Study Suggests

A new study presented at the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases shows that “antimicrobial resistance (AMR) was linked to the deaths of 3 million children in 2022.” CIDRAP has the news.

Nearly half of those deaths were in children in Southeast Asia and Africa, “and many were linked to the use of antibiotics that aren’t intended for first-line treatment.” The researchers looked at AMR-related deaths in children across 83 countries and calculated the death burden “using the WHO’s Access, Watch and Reserve (AWaRe) antibiotic classification system.”

The AWaRe system “is a tool created by the WHO to monitor and evaluate global use of antibiotics and limit the spread of AMR.” Antibiotics in the Access group “are first-line, narrow-spectrum drugs recommended for most common bacterial infections. The Watch and Reserve categories are for broader-spectrum antibiotics that should be limited to treatment of more serious infections to preserve their effectiveness. In 2019, the WHO launched a campaign to increase the global proportion of Access antibiotic use to at least 60%.” However, several studies have found that hitting that goal has been difficult in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

Of the 3 million or so AMR-related deaths the researchers estimated, over 752,000 were in Southeast Asia, and more than 659,000 were in Africa. From 2019 through 2021, “the use of Watch antibiotics increased by 160% in Southeast Asia and 126% in Africa.” The use of Reserve antibiotics also rose. Over 2 million of the AMR-associated pediatric deaths were associated with Watch and Reserve antibiotics.

Joseph Harwell, the study’s coauthor, called for “urgent and coordinated action,” including “increased AMR surveillance,” at global and regional levels to bring the number of AMR-associated pediatric deaths down.