Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2019 Aug 29;24(17):3152.
doi: 10.3390/molecules24173152.

Fight Against Antimicrobial Resistance: We Always Need New Antibacterials but for Right Bacteria

Raphaël E Duval  1   2 , Marion Grare  3 , Béatrice Demoré  4   5
Affiliations
Review

Fight Against Antimicrobial Resistance: We Always Need New Antibacterials but for Right Bacteria

Raphaël E Duval et al. Molecules. .

Abstract

Antimicrobial resistance in bacteria is frightening, especially resistance in Gram-negative Bacteria (GNB). In 2017, the World Health Organization (WHO) published a list of 12 bacteria that represent a threat to human health, and among these, a majority of GNB. Antibiotic resistance is a complex and relatively old phenomenon that is the consequence of several factors. The first factor is the vertiginous drop in research and development of new antibacterials. In fact, many companies simply stop this R&D activity. The finding is simple: there are enough antibiotics to treat the different types of infection that clinicians face. The second factor is the appearance and spread of resistant or even multidrug-resistant bacteria. For a long time, this situation remained rather confidential, almost anecdotal. It was not until the end of the 1980s that awareness emerged. It was the time of Vancomycin-Resistance Enterococci (VRE), and the threat of Vancomycin-Resistant MRSA (Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus). After this, there has been renewed interest but only in anti-Gram positive antibacterials. Today, the threat is GNB, and we have no new molecules with innovative mechanism of action to fight effectively against these bugs. However, the war against antimicrobial resistance is not lost. We must continue the fight, which requires a better knowledge of the mechanisms of action of anti-infectious agents and concomitantly the mechanisms of resistance of infectious agents.

Keywords: antimicrobial resistance; drug discovery; multidrug-resistant bacteria; new antibacterials.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The main causes of death by 2050 [7].
Figure 2
Figure 2
Evolution of the FDA-approved antibiotics since 1983. Modified from Reference [10] and completed with References [11,12].
Figure 3
Figure 3
Antibiotics timeline from the end of the 1920s until today, indicating when the main antibiotic classes were discovered, and when the mechanisms of resistance to these antibiotics were first described.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Infectious Diseases Society of America Bag Bugs, No Drugs: As Antibiotic Discovery Stagnates, A Public Health Crisis Brews. [(accessed on 15 August 2019)]; Available online: https://www.idsociety.org/globalassets/idsa/policy--advocacy/current_top....
    1. Boucher H.W., Talbot G.H., Bradley J.S., Edwards J.E., Gilbert D., Rice L.B., Scheld M., Spellberg B., Bartlett J. Bad bugs, no drugs: No ESKAPE! An update from the Infectious Diseases Society of America. Clin. Infect. Dis. 2009;48:1–12. doi: 10.1086/595011. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Infectious Diseases Society of America The 10 × ’20 Initiative: Pursuing a global commitment to develop 10 new antibacterial drugs by 2020. Clin. Infect. Dis. 2010;50:1081–1083. doi: 10.1086/652237. - DOI - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization WHO Publishes List of Bacteria for Which New Antibiotics are Urgently Needed. [(accessed on 15 August 2019)]; Available online: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2017/bacteria-antibiotics-n...
    1. World Health Organization Global Priority List of Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria to Guide Research, Discovery, and Development of New Antibiotics. [(accessed on 15 August 2019)]; Available online: http://www.who.int/medicines/publications/WHO-PPL-Short_Summary_25Feb-ET....

MeSH terms