Is Antimicrobial Resistance Evolution Accelerating?

A team of researchers from Freie Universität Berlin and ETH Zurich studied if antifungal and antibiotic resistance emerge faster than in the past. No 199/2020 from Oct 23, 2020 Scientists from Freie Universität Berlin and Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich (ETH Zurich) investigated how long it takes for resistance to emerge after the introduction of a new antifungal or antibiotic. Jens Rolff, evolutionary biologist at Freie Universität Berlin and one of the authors of the study, considers the results to be potentially alarming. The findings suggest that drugs that have been introduced more recently lose their potency faster than older drugs in most cases. The evolutionary dynamics leading to this development urgently warrant in-depth study to inform public health measures and drug development. Statistics already show that several 10,000 people in the EU alone die from antibiotic resistant infections annually. The results of the study were published in the journal PLOS Pathogens .