Antibiotic resistance: the hidden threat lurking behind Covid-19

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic highlights the critical need for rapid development of vaccines and antiviral treatments to reduce the number of hospitalizations and deaths caused by this dangerous new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. The biopharmaceutical industry has quickly responded and at least 80 candidates are already in development. With good luck, we will eventually have some of the tools we need to fight this new global threat.

But there is an even larger threat lurking behind the current outbreak, one that is already killing hundreds of thousands of people around the world and that will complicate the care of many Covid-19 patients. It is the hidden threat from antibiotic resistance — bacteria that are not killed by standard antibiotics. Unfortunately, the pipeline of drugs to manage these deadly infections is nearly dry.

Although antibiotic resistance hasn’t gotten our attention in the same way that SARS-CoV-2 has, antibiotic-resistant bacteria present a growing global menace. In the U.S. alone, we see 2.8 million antibiotic-resistant infections each year and more than 35,000 deaths, though experts fear that the real number is much higher. The so-called superbugs that cause these infections thrive in hospitals and medical facilities, putting all patients — whether they’re getting care for a minor illness or major surgery — at risk.

The patients at greatest risk from superbugs are the ones who are already more vulnerable to illness from viral lung infections like influenza, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), and Covid-19. The 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic, for example, claimed nearly 300,000 lives around the world. Many of those deaths — between 29% and 55% — were actually caused by secondary bacterial pneumonia, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It’s a one-two punch: A virus can weaken the body, making it easier for complex, hard-to-treat bacteria to take hold.

The new coronavirus is no exception. Already, some studies have found that 1 in 7 patients hospitalized with Covid-19 has acquired a dangerous secondary bacterial infection, and 50% of patients who have died had such infections. The challenge of antibiotic resistance could become an enormous force of additional sickness and death across our health system as the toll of coronavirus pneumonia stretches critical care units beyond their capacity.

Seventeen years ago, when I was leading the CDC, we worried about antibiotic resistance complicating the care of SARS patients. We knew then that America’s arsenal of antibiotics was not sufficient to guarantee we could manage a large outbreak of drug-resistant bacteria. Since then, these bacteria have only become more widespread, more deadly, and far more difficult to treat, yet our stable of antibiotics to manage them has barely increased. In fact, the gap between the superbug threats we face and the antibiotics we have to combat them is rapidly growing wider.

We can’t predict when or where the next pandemic-triggering virus will emerge, but we can predict that secondary bacterial infections will follow. To fight these superbugs, we desperately need new antibiotics. An important question policymakers should be asking themselves is this: Why don’t we have powerful antibiotics on hand when we need them the most?

In a perfect world, we would always have new antibiotics to fight emerging antibiotic-resistant infections, ready to use when a crisis like the Covid-19 pandemic strikes. But developing new antibiotics takes time and can cost more than $1 billion and that investment cannot be recovered by wide use of new antibiotics because they must be used as sparingly as possible to preserve their effectiveness for as long as possible.

Current hospital reimbursement systems generally discourage use of new antibiotics, even when patients clearly need them, because they are more expensive than older antibiotics. Understandably, hospitals that are already challenged to cover the rising costs of care find it hard to justify the inclusion of more expensive drugs on their formularies.

As a result of this unique market dynamic — low reimbursement and low-volume use — many of our country’s most promising antibiotic developers have gone out of business or suffered severe financial losses, including three biotechnology companies within the last year.

This market failure must be corrected as if lives depend on it because they do — as we may soon see as cases of Covid-19 increase. Reimbursement reform will both improve appropriate access to novel antibiotics and encourage private investment in the pipeline. While other proposals have been discussed, including stockpiling and further grant funding for research, these measures do not address the underlying issues.

Recognizing this need is critical, Sens. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Reps. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) and Kenny Marchant (R-Texas) have introduced the Developing an Innovative Strategy for Antimicrobial Resistant Microorganisms (DISARM) Act, a bipartisan bill that would reform Medicare reimbursement to make it easier for hospitals to use the antibiotic that is most appropriate for a patient. Right now, there’s a strict cap on how much hospitals are reimbursed by Medicare for inpatient services, which deters use of new targeted antibiotics that might be the best course of therapy for patients with superbug infections.

Passing the DISARM Act is a first step we can take to help ensure that hospitals are not financially penalized when providing patients the lifesaving antibiotics they need. This is good for patients and will, in turn, sustain the confidence investors need to support companies developing new antibiotics. Policymakers must also create incentives, like market entry rewards and other “pull” mechanisms, that clearly signal to biopharmaceutical companies that the antibiotic pipeline merits ongoing research and development investment.

As we come together to fight today’s Covid-19 crisis, we must also look ahead to the next one. We cannot be short-sighted, and we cannot be complacent, especially about antibiotic resistance. We must put measures in place to ensure that we have the antibiotics we need — today and in the future. The time to act is now.

Julie L. Gerberding, M.D., is chief patient officer and executive vice president for strategic communications, global public policy, and population health at Merck. She was director of the CDC from 2002 to 2009.