Infectious diseases expert Peter Collignon supports tight control over food-production practices
Worldwide, increases in deaths and morbidity in humans are associated with rapid increases in rates of antibiotic resistance in bacteria. This problem is escalating more quickly in gram-negative bacteria such as Escherichia coli. On occasion, no antibiotics work. As no new antibiotic classes are in the development pipeline for gram-negative bacteria, we need to preserve the antibiotics we have for as long as possible.1
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- 1. Carlet J, Collignon P, Goldmann D, et al. Society’s failure to protect a precious resource: antibiotics. Lancet 2011; 378: 369-371.
- 2. Anderson ES. Drug resistance in Salmonella typhimurium and its implications. Br Med J 1968; 3: 333-339.
- 3. Collignon P. Resistant Escherichia coli — we are what we eat. Clin Infect Dis 2009; 49: 202-204.
- 4. Overdevest I, Willemsen I, Rijnsburger M, et al. Extended-spectrum β-lactamase genes of Escherichia coli in chicken meat and humans, the Netherlands. Emerg Infect Dis 2011; 17: 1216-1222.
- 5. Collignon P, Powers JH, Chiller TM, et al. World Health Organization ranking of antimicrobials according to their importance in human medicine: a critical step for developing risk management strategies for the use of antimicrobials in food production animals. Clin Infect Dis 2009; 49: 132-141.
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