Gaborone – African health ministers today endorsed a regional strategy to ramp up action against antimicrobial resistance, which is estimated to have directly contributed to 1.27 million deaths in sub-Saharan Africa in 2019.
The region faces a high burden of antimicrobial resistance, which occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites change over time and no longer respond to medicines, making infections harder to treat. Globally, around 10 million people – including 4.1 million in the African region – are projected to die of antimicrobial resistance by 2050.