Using a Difficult-to-treat Resistance Index to Gauge Imbalance between Countries’ Antibiotic Resistance Prevalence and Access to Antibiotics: A Scoping Review and Concept Proposal
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) remains a major threat that is worsened by global disparities in access to antibiotics. At the United Nations General Assembly second high-level meeting for AMR in September 2024, member nations declared a commitment to improve equitable access to antimicrobials particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).[1] However, mechanisms to capture the impact of improved antibiotic access remain unclear as access limitations do not feature within AMR definitions or burden estimates. A recent epidemiological analysis that estimated 1.14 million AMR-attributable deaths globally in 2021[2] did not consider impacts of two key treatment challenges: antibiotic access limitations or even resistance to multiple antibiotics.
Authors
Morgan K. Walker, Emad A. Chishti, Christina Yek, Sadia Sarzynski, Sahil Angelo, Jennifer Cohn, Alicia A. Livinski, Sameer S. Kadri