BackGovt lens on misuse of anti-microbials
Antimicrobial resistance is recognized by the World Health Organization as one of the top 10 global public health threats
PremiumThe union health ministry is in the process identifying additional regulatory interventions to stop the misuse of antimicrobial drugs being sold without a doctor’s prescription.
The ministry aims to strengthen enforcement measures to prevent diversion for illegal use of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients of antimicrobials for uses including as a growth promoter and for preventing disease in animals. Antibiotics fail to work in patients when they are routinely exposed to these drugs through the food chain, a public health threat called antimicrobial resistance (AMR).
AMR is recognized by the World Health Organization as one of the top 10 global public health threats. The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has directed for the constitution of an expert panel to review suggestions and give its recommendation at the earliest.
“The strategy and its importance which needed to be adopted for addressing the issue of AMR were discussed based on the National Action Plan on AMR (NAP-AMR) relating to AMR drugs regulatory enforcement, ensure prescription sale of antibiotics, review the categorization of high end antimicrobials as well as new antibiotics in Schedule X/H1 of national regulations, restrict antibiotics in animal feed and ensure registration of and data collection from manufacturers, sellers, prescribers and bulk users (farmers and feed manufactures) of antibiotics among other strategies were discussed," said an official aware of the matter. According to the health ministry, reported AMR cases spiked more than 4.5 times from 25,833 in 2017 to 119,686 till December last year.
Queries sent to the health ministry remained unanswered.
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