- Dame Sally Davies says pushy patients are partly to blame
- Warned of deaths from minor cuts, hip replacements and caesareans
- Her remarks follow a stark warning from the Prime Minister
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Patients should not put pressure on GPs to give them unnecessary antibiotics, according to the chief medical officer.
Dame Sally Davies says pushy patients are partly to blame for the rise of deadly superbugs that are immune to the drugs.
She warned of possible future deaths from minor cuts, hip replacements and caesarean sections after infections have set in.
Warning: Dame Sally Davies says pushy patients are partly to blame for the rise of deadly superbugs
‘If a doctor says antibiotics are not appropriate for an illness, we should all listen and not pressurise them into giving us unnecessary drugs,’ she said. ‘Resistance to antibiotics is a real threat.
‘If we do not act now to protect the antibiotics we have, the medicine cabinet will be bare and deaths from infections will rise because of it.’
Her remarks follow a stark warning from the Prime Minister that Britain faces returning to the ‘dark ages of medicine’ where antibiotics no longer work.
David Cameron is vowing urgent action to find new drugs to prevent this ‘unthinkable scenario’.
The crisis has been caused by decades of overuse of antibiotics in human medicine as well as on animals. Bacteria have progressively evolved and an increasing number of strains are resistant to the drugs.
To make matters worse, drug companies have not produced any newer antibiotics in recent years as they are not profitable. Dame Sally said: ‘We have been steadily losing antibiotics over time and yet we are not getting new ones to replace them. The cupboard’s pretty empty.
‘I want parents and patients to listen to the GP when the GP says I don’t believe this is bacterial, I’m not prescribing antibiotics.’
Clostridium difficile aka c. difficile, the superbug
She said it was difficult for doctors to be sure whether a sore throat or cough had been caused by a bacteria or a virus.
Antibiotics do not work against a virus but when put under pressure by patients – or worried parents –GPs will prescribe them as a precaution.
She added: ‘Patients do demand antibiotics inappropriately quite often because they don’t understand that they are not appropriate for all infections. We need to increase understanding.
‘It is very difficult to be certain of the diagnosis in a GP surgery when you have a sick patient with a high temperature in front of you.’
John Cormack, a GP in South Woodham Ferrers, near Chelmsford, Essex, said some patients expected to come away from appointments with drugs as if they were ‘little presents’. He added: ‘There are cases where the message hasn’t come across. People have the attitude where we must not come away empty-handed.
‘Some GPs feel under pressure to prescribe.’
Dr Maureen Baker, chairman of the Royal College of GPs, said: ‘Antibiotics are brilliant as long as they are properly prescribed and used appropriately.
‘But the public’s reliance on them is worrying and GPs face enormous pressure from patients to prescribe them, even for minor symptoms that can be effectively treated with other medication or that will get better on their own over time.
‘Patients and the public need to be aware of the risks associated with antibiotics. If they are taken frequently and over long periods of time bacteria will adapt to them, eventually making the treatment ineffective and weakening your immune system.’
The Prime Minister yesterday announced he had launched a review to encourage the development of new antibiotics.
He said: ‘If we fail to act, we are looking at an almost unthinkable scenario where antibiotics no longer work and we are cast back into the dark ages of medicine where treatable infections and injuries will kill once again.’
Jim O’Neill, former chief economist at Goldman Sachs, will lead an international group of experts aiming to spur drug development.
An initial grant of £500,000 to fund the work will come from the Wellcome Trust.
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Tee-n-the-Wildlife,
Evanston, United States,
21 minutes ago
Well, duh.
Single,
East Devon, United Kingdom,
3 hours ago
Had we not picked up bugs when we was in hospital I would not be on antibiotics for some 6 years, and every time I try and do without them the same bugs come back. I won’t demand if you keep your hospitals clean, you instruct your staff to wash their hands after every patient has been treated, and employ some professionals who know the meaning of cleaning a ward and not with licks and promises. I also suggest that when your staff is chosen (not for qualifications) but to politically correctly to make up the numbers, then I would not have to keep taking the tablets, and my health could be safe again as twice in hospital. Twice, caught the bugs. Oh and why are there no bugs in private hospitals?
One Eyed Man,
Littlehampton,
4 hours ago
Listen to your Doctor, he is the expert and knows what he is talking about, he doesn’t need to listen to amateurs waffling on about what they think they need. Take his advice and you get better, take the advice of an amateur(you) and you get worse.
RBB,
Carlisle, United Kingdom,
4 hours ago
It depends on your GP. I went to the doctors on the Friday and they won’t issue antibiotics, I then got admitted to hospital for over a week three days later with a big infection. If they had prescribed them on the Friday the NHS would have saved a lot of money!
Diggity,
Cheshire,
4 hours ago
Amazing how you can buy Antibiotics over the Counter in most U.S states, and yet it doesn’t seem to be awash of antibiotic resistant diseases. In comparison, after a serious leg crush injury, I wasn’t given antibiotics, and it was only when it was ravaged by negative gram bacteria that they ‘got around’ to giving them to me.
uk is finished,
bath,
5 hours ago
earache and cystitis are two conditions that are dealt with by the body but people will still want them
Charlie,
England,
5 hours ago
“Patients should not put pressure on GPs to give them unnecessary antibiotics, according to the chief medical officer.†Yes, we know this. Tell those foolish GPs who ignore their training and medical advice not to hand them out like sweets if their patients plead for it.
Walter Bean,
Hull, United Kingdom,
6 hours ago
50% of all antibiotics are given to factory farm animals who are kept in such confined conditions that disease spreads like wildfire
worker7,
Ferndown, United Kingdom,
6 hours ago
The vets issue and charge for most illness . My cat had diarrhoea £50 and antibiotics . Pain the same .off food the same
angrydoc,
london,
4 hours ago
worker7,
Ferndown, United Kingdom,
6 hours ago
These useless GPs will not give antibiotics . The only way is to go to other doctors I find that worked for me
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