Infectious Diseases: Drug Resistance
(asked on 18th April 2023) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the annual cost to the NHS of (a) drug-resistant infections generally and (b) imported drug-resistant infections resulting from overseas travel.
In 2018, the estimated cost of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) infections to the National Health Service in England was £180 million per year. The English surveillance programme for antimicrobial utilisation and resistance 2022 report estimated that there was an equivalent of 148 severe antibiotic resistant infections a day in England in 2021. The report is available at the following link:
The UK Health Security Agency estimates that antibiotic resistant infections cost an additional £100 to £500 per infection.
There is some evidence that international travel is a risk for the acquisition of antibiotic resistant organisms. However, the cost estimates are not broken down by origin of infection.
To address the threat of AMR, in 2019 the Government published its vision for AMR to be contained and controlled by 2040, which is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-20-year-vision-for-antimicrobial-resistance
This is supported by the first five-year National Action Plan, also published in 2019, which is available at the following link:
This tackles AMR through reducing the need for, and unintentional exposure to, antimicrobials, optimising the use of antimicrobials, and investing in innovation, supply and access.