Antibiotics losing effectiveness worldwide

The warning from the World Health Organisation (WHO) that the world is fast entering into an era where ailments like common infections could turn deadly as antibiotics lose effectiveness has sent a collective chill down policymakers' spines globally. The problem it appears is the manner in which antibiotics are prescribed by health practitioners and the way they are consumed. In the report published, WHO warns that unless governments around the world pump new funds into producing a whole new range of medication, the rate at which resistance to antibiotics is growing, the world could be facing a greater threat to health than AIDS.
With the emergence of drug-resistant strains of bacteria, it is now clear that current medicines are facing an uphill task in combating diseases. It has become more imperative than ever that governments around the world coordinate actions and put money into research to produce new medication that can tackle these new strains of bacteria. In the short term, concerted effort is required whereby greater restriction is placed on antibiotics so that they may not be prescribed as wilfully as they are now. Pharmaceutical companies need to be provided incentives so that the billions of dollars needed in research into new medication are pumped in without delay.
Health experts fear, and with good reason, that with antibiotics losing efficacy the death toll resulting from common diseases long understood to be treatable suddenly take on the character of global killers. This is an unthinkable scenario and one that needs to be tackled seriously by policymakers everywhere.