Antibiotic resistance in Sub-Saharan Africa: Current Trends and Challenges

Abstract

Antibiotics play a crucial role in the treatment and management of bacterial infections, leading to a reduction in death in both humans and animals. Over a period of time, bacteria become resistant to antibiotics which can worsen the intensity or severity of the infection. It is therefore this review paper’s objective to review the trends and challenges of antibiotic resistance in Sub-Saharan Africa. A total of 20 articles were obtained from the web which included countries from West, South, East and Central Africa. It was observed that bacteria in the environment were more resistant to Metronidazole and less resistant to Tetracycline. Among humans, it was discovered that Ampicillin had the highest resistance whiles Ciprofloxacin had the lowest resistance. In food mediums, Amoxicillin/Clavulanate is observed to be the antibiotic with the highest resistance whiles Imipenem had the lowest resistance. It was also observed that with increasing years, some antibiotics reduced in resistance which shows the effectiveness of regulations on antibiotic usage.  In conclusion it can be said that regulations on antibiotic usage is poor and very specific to certain antibiotics which should not be the case as it shifts the attention on usage to other antibiotics thereby making them resistant.