Widespread, occasional use of antibiotics in U.S. linked with resistance
The increasing prevalence of antibiotic resistance in the U.S. appears more closely linked to their occasional use by many people than to their repeated use among smaller numbers of people, according to a large new study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The study also found that antibiotic use varies across the nation, and that in areas where particular antibiotics are used more frequently, resistance to those antibiotics is higher. “We know that efforts to reduce inappropriate use of antibiotics are critical to addressing the problem of antibiotic resistance. We wondered whether every antibiotic prescription contributes equally to resistance, and whether, as some previous research has suggested, the most effective way to minimize antibiotic resistance would be to focus on the small fraction of people who use most of the antibiotics,” said Yonatan Grad, the Melvin J. and Geraldine L. Glimcher Assistant Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases and senior...