Authors: Martha Powell, Future Science Group
New research, presented at ASM Microbe (20—24 June 2019, San Francisco, CA, USA), has suggested that public campaigns have largely been ineffective at reducing antibiotic prescribing.
The authors assessed antibiotic use in Belgium, the sixth largest antibiotic using country in Europe. In Belgium public campaigns have been launched yearly to reduce prescriptions, however, in parallel, cheap generic antibiotics have also been introduced with government support. The researchers hoped to investigate the impact of these actions on the prescription level of antibiotics in the community.