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MRSA and antibiotic over (under) prescribing in Norway

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  • #2
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 93,599 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    He points to an antibiotic. "If I treated someone with an infection in Spain with this penicillin I would probably be thrown in jail," he says, "and rightly so because it's useless there."
    Wow penicillin is still useful in Norway


  • #3
    SomeDose
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 252 ✭✭SomeDose


    Scandinavian countries (and also the Netherlands I think) have historically produced extremely low prevalence rates of MRSA bacteremias, at least in comparison to the UK and US. Sweden has adopted a similar approach to Norway (the STRAMA program) aimed at prudent and reduced use of antibiotics, and has achieved a significant decrease in antibiotic prescribing without any apparent increase in morbidity which might've been attributed to non-treatment. This is by no means a new strategy - back in the 1970s, a study based in 3 Birmingham hospitals showed reduced rates of tetracycline-resistant MRSA after tetracycline precribing was deliberately restricted.

    It's slightly disingenuous, however, to attribute high rates of MRSA solely to inappropriate prescribing of antibiotics. I remember reading an article not too long ago which mentioned that the UK had broadly similar antibiotic usage to Finland, which has much lower rates of infection. The Norway article you linked to highlights other strategies such as tracking of infections and strict isolation protocols (I'm kinda sceptical of a lot of the current infection control bluster but isolation is definitely effective). There are various other ways to tackle the problem, for example the hospital where I work runs an outpatient IV antibiotic service which allows patients to be treated at home with prolonged courses of IVs which otherwise would've necessitated them being stuck in hospital for >3-4 weeks. In the past, this kind of scenario would've put the patient at a much higher risk of contracting a hospital-acquired infection, and also provides the bugs with the perfect environment in which to develop resistance.


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