Antibiotic prescriptions ‘up 6% in 3 years’

GPs and hospitals in the UK are prescribing six per cent more antibiotics than they were in 2010, despite experts having urged they cut down due to increasing levels of microbial resistance.

This is according to Public Health England (PHE), which published the first annual report from its English Surveillance Programme for Antimicrobial Utilisation and Resistance (ESPAUR) programme today (October 10th).

It found that in the past four years, the country's antibiotic consumption has risen from 25.9 to 27.4 doses per 1,000 people per day.

The number of bloodstream infections caused by E.coli increased 12 per cent in the same timeframe, of which between ten and 19 per cent were resistant to key antibiotics.

In general, higher rates of resistance were seen in regions with higher rates of prescribing. London was home to the greatest volume of hospital prescribing per population, while in Darlington and Tees, GP prescriptions were 40 per cent higher than in the capital.

Dr Susan Hopkins, a healthcare epidemiologist at PHE and lead author of the report, described the research as "a real move forward in our understanding of antibiotic prescribing habits".

"The aim now must be to reduce levels of prescribing back to that seen in 2010," she warned.