President Barack Obama wants to put an end to the continuous rise of drug-resistant bacteria by signing an executive order last Thursday. The EO sets up a task force as well as a multi-million-dollar prize.
The five-year program called "National Strategy on Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria" creates the inter-agency task force that will include the Department of Agriculture, Department of Defense, and Health and Human Services.
They are in charge of seeing to it drugs are used accordingly, minimizing misuse and wrong diagnosis. They will also increase efforts in developing new types of drugs and therapies that can help combat the growth of new superbugs. The task force is expected to provide its first documented action plan by February next year.
Other agencies are also mandated to review and amend policies that relate to drug employment. The Food and Drug Administration, for example, is required to remove use of certain medications that are given to livestock and poultry to rapidly increase their growth, especially since these animals consume no less than 75% of antibiotics. Rather, agencies should develop new means of growing agriculture and livestock to avoid dependence on drugs.
Meanwhile, Democratic New York representative Louise Slaughter has just created a legislation that aims to reduce overuse of antibiotics by giving them only to sick animals.
The U.S. government is also earmarking $20 million to scientists and researchers that can develop a reliable and accurate tests that can help determine new superbugs. The prize is a collaboration between Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority and National Institutes of Health.
The president and his team believe that superbugs are a major domestic and international threat. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, drug-resistant bacteria have caused more than 2 million illnesses that resulted to over 20,000 deaths. These include Clostridium difficile, a bacterial infection of the digestive tract, which has already killed 14,000 people.