‘It is a pandemic’: UK’s envoy on superbugs says scale of threat underestimated

Dame Sally Davies says action on deadly antibiotic-resistant infections must be prioritised

The rising death toll from drug-resistant bugs is very scary" and people do not even realise it is happening, the UK's special envoy for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has said.

Superbugs kill more than a million people each year but neither governments nor the public recognise the scale of the threat, doctors complain. The crisis is largely driven by the misuse of antibiotics - about 70% of which are given to livestock - which encourages the evolution of microbes too strong for modern medicine to handle.