Antibiotics being used indiscriminately
Say experts
Antibiotics have turned ineffective against various diseases, as the critical drugs are being prescribed and sold indiscriminately.
Experts quote different local studies as saying that because of misuse, most people have developed 40 to 100 percent resistance to the commonly used antibiotics.
Gram-positive microorganisms have become 40 percent resistant to Azithromycin, one of the most commonly used antibiotics, says Prof AK Azad Chowdhury of clinical pharmacy and pharmacology department, Dhaka University (DU).
Prof Azad quoted the data from a study titled ''Antibiotic prescription pattern in district hospitals in Bangladesh." DU in collaboration with University of Nottingham, UK conducted it from July to December 2009 at six district hospitals.
Ciprofloxacin, the most commonly prescribed second-generation drug that worked effectively against E Coli and gram-negative microorganisms, now encounters resistance in 78 percent cases.
So the patients, to cure the infections, now are depending on Levofloxacin, a third generation antibiotic, reveals the study.
Ciprofloxacin is the only antibiotic currently recommended by World Health Organisation (WHO) for the management of diarrhoea due to Shigella organisms.
But rapidly increasing prevalence of resistance to ciprofloxacin is reducing the options for safe and efficacious treatment of shigellosis, particularly for children. New antibiotics suitable for oral use are badly needed, according to the WHO website.
Resistance has also been developed against Amoxicillin and Ampicilin in the country, which is still commonly prescribed in the UK for treating infections. Against Erythromycin, another antibiotic, resistance is now 100 percent.
After few years it would be difficult to treat the patients, as no antibiotic would work then, said Prof Azad.
He suggested formulation of antimicrobial policy so that the government monitors that doctors prescribe antibiotics after confirming that the patient needs them, and medicine stores sell antibiotics only after receiving prescriptions from the buyers.
Selling the antibiotics without prescription is strictly prohibited in almost all the developed countries considering the risk of the drugs' being antimicrobial resistance.
But as there is no policy and standard practice in the country, all the drug shops are selling antibiotic without bothering to see the doctors' prescription. Doctors also often arbitrarily prescribe antibiotic without confirmation.
While selling Azithromycin without any prescription, Bulbul Ahmed, a salesman of Friends Pharma at the city's Green road, said he does not know anything about this standard practice.
"It is the narcotic drugs, for which we seek doctors' prescription," he said, adding that if they seek prescription from the customers for selling antibiotics, their sale will be dropped significantly.
On the other hand, as the patients are easily getting the antibiotics, they do not bother to finish the course of antibiotics properly and often stop taking antibiotic halfway whenever they feel better.
All these facts actually cause insensitivity and inefficiency of the antibiotics on different microorganisms and finally increases duration to cure the disease, treatment cost, and dissatisfaction among the patients, say experts.
Antimicrobial resistance is now a global problem as 50 percent of antibiotics are prescribed irrationally across the globe and of these 50 percent is wrongly used. About 440,000 new cases of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) emerge annually, causing at least 150,000 deaths.
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