The global problem of AMR

Antibiotics are at the heart of our health system. Without them, standard surgical procedures, cancer treatment, tackling infections, and more, would all be in peril. Yet the major threat of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) overshadows the security of future health provision, it is a silent and potentially devastating pandemic triggered by bacteria developing resistance to antibiotics.

Without a solution, scientists warn that by 2050 antibiotic resistance to once treatable infections could kill up to 10 million people a year, matching deaths caused by cancer. In 2019 alone, antibiotic-resistant infections contributed to the deaths of 5 million people in total.

The fight against AMR is made harder by the limitations of the current methods of identifying infection. With bacterial analysis needed to accurately analyse the cause of an infection, samples need to be sent to specialist laboratory settings, with wait times for results taking up to three days and sometimes longer.

In this time, drugs are often prescribed “just in case” to prevent the risk of the infection becoming more serious. The World Bank estimates misuse of antibiotics in this way could result in $1tn in additional health costs by 2050. 

Recognising that AMR is one of the most significant global issues we face, with the potential to impact on billions of lives and threatening modern medicine as we know it, Challenge Works launched the Longitude Prize on AMR in 2014. The purpose of the prize was to incentivise the creation of new diagnostic tests that, in a matter of minutes, could identify whether an infection is bacterial, and if it is, which specific antibiotic to prescribe, in-so-doing helping to tackle resistance caused by mis-prescription.

A timely test that accurately detects bacteria and identifies the antibiotic it responds to would be transformational. Ensuring that the right antibiotic is prescribed to the patient the first time would limit inaccurate prescriptions that can be responsible for the development of resistant infections.

The winner of the Longitude Prize on AMR, the PA-100 AST System by Sysmex Astrego delivers this innovation both in speed and the ability to prescribe targeted antibiotics for UTIs.

We have an opportunity now to bring advanced diagnostics into healthcare systems, to better diagnose and treat common infections, reduce risk of advanced infection, better equip healthcare professionals and start to limit the spread of antimicrobial resistance.

Tackling AMR is a national and international necessity and we are proud of the impact the Longitude Prize on AMR will have in this.