The growing challenge of antimicrobial resistance in the South-East Asia Region - Are we losing the battle?

The discovery of antibiotics in the early part of 20th century and their spectacular success in combating infections and deaths created a complacency during the 1960s and 1970s. Over the past six decades, these ‘wonder drugs’ have played a critical role in reducing the global burden of communicable diseases. This success was however, overshadowed by the rapid backlash by the microbes resulting in a “relentless and dizzying rise of antimicrobial resistance”1. We seem to have come a full circle from the pre-antibiotic phase through a stage of euphoria to a seemingly frightening era of patients infected with multidrug resistant bacteria desperate for the elusive magic bullet2. In the recent past, especially, the emergence and spread of resistance in several microorganisms have rendered the management of many infectious diseases difficult.