Another source of antibiotic resistance (which the article forgets to mention) is their routine use in livestock, preventatively and to accelerate growth. I would wager that is the far more significant contributor, since there's simply much more of it - compare the total number of cattle in places where such use is allowed (meaning cattle are exposed to antibiotics for most of their lives), versus the number of people being treated with antibiotics (i.e. a very limited population, for a very limited period):

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12029767/

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6017557/

The whole article talks about tracking and tracking better is helpful I get that but that won't stop it reverse the trend? Even in areas where we have clean data we see the trends.

So what's next?

I’m really glad this article acknowledges that better access to antibiotics is probably the best solution to the problem. I’ve actually heard people argue the opposite.

Many people, even doctors will blame patients for creating antibiotics resistant strains. While it’s true that a resistant strain can develop and spread due to an individual’s actions, those strains will gradually lose their resistance once no longer exposed to antibiotics, so it’s probably better have antibiotics be accessible drugs everywhere to prevent any initial spread and just trust people won’t use them chronically for no reason. Though I’d argue lack of access to antibiotics contributes more to the spread of disease then careless patients stuffing down their mouths, it really depends on what type of bacteria it is. Patients with viruses often misdiagnose themselves as needing antibiotics and that’s another reason it’s not over the counter, that builds resistant bacteria, not inside the patient but in the external environment due to excretion in urine etc.

Doctors will often chide patients for not taking the whole bottle of antibiotics once they stop feeling symptoms as if this gives more opportunity for the resistant strain to spread. It’s true it’s probably safer to totally ensure you are free of disease before stopping a medication, but increasing the overall level of antibiotics in the environment boosts resistance in every case. As people on this thread have pointed out the mass use of antibiotics in cattle farming is going to contribute significantly to resistance because it permanently increases the amount of antibiotics in the environment. Other than stopping that not much can be done to prevent this

It’s kind of a non-issue on an individual level as resistant strains lose resistance over relatively short periods time, once no longer exposed to the antibiotic, people just assume if the bacteria evolved an advantageous trait it will never lose that trait even though it’s no longer advantageous once it’s environment returns to normal.