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According to the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, superbugs will kill someone every three seconds by 2050 unless the world acts now.

The global review sets out a plan for preventing medicine “being cast back into the dark ages” that requires billions of dollars of investment.

The report also calls for a revolution in the way antibiotics are used and a massive campaign to educate people.

It has received a mixed response with some concerned that it does not go far enough.

The battle against infections that are resistant to drugs is one the world is losing rapidly and has been described as “as big a risk as terrorism”.Review on Antimicrobial Resistance 2016

The problem is that we are simply not developing enough new antibiotics and we are wasting the ones we have.

Since the review started in mid-2014, more than one million people have died from such infections.

In that time doctors also discovered bacteria that can shrug off the drug of last resort – colistin – leading to warnings that the world was teetering on the cusp of a “post-antibiotic era”.

The report says the situation will get only worse with 10 million people predicted to die every year from resistant infections by 2050.

The analysis was based on scenarios modeled by researchers Rand Europe and auditors KPMG.

They found that drug resistant E. coli, malaria and tuberculosis (TB) would have the biggest impact.

The financial cost to economies of drug resistance will add up to $100 trillion by the mid-point of the century.

The Review on Antimicrobial Resistance said the economic case for action “was clear” and could be paid for using a small cut of the current health budgets of countries or through extra taxes on pharmaceutical companies not investing in antibiotic research.

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Brazilian researchers have discovered a drug-resistant bacterium in the sea waters where sailing and windsurfing events will be held during the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

The “super-bacteria” is usually found in hospital waste and produces an enzyme, KPC, resistant to antibiotics.

Researchers found the bacteria in samples taken from Flamengo beach.

Nearly 70% of sewage in Rio – a city of some 10 million people – is spilled raw into the waters of Guanabara Bay.

The bacterium was found in samples taken from several locations along the Carioca river.

One of them was at the point where the river flows into the bay on Flamengo beach.Superbug Flamengo beach

Residents have been told to take extra care. Flamengo beach is frequently declared unfit for swimming, but many people disregard the official warnings.

The superbug can cause urinary, gastrointestinal and pulmonary infections.

“The problem is that in case of infection it is possible that treatment involves hospitalization,” said Ana Paula D’Alincourt Carvalho Assef, the study coordinator at Rio’s renowned Oswaldo Cruz Institute.

“Since the super-bacteria is resistant to the most modern medications, doctors need to rely on drugs that are rarely used because they are toxic to the organism,” she told the AP news agency.

In its Olympic bid, Rio promised to reduce pollution in Guanabara Bay by 80%.

In June Rio Mayor Eduardo Silva admitted the target would not be met.

The authorities say they understand athletes’ concerns but insist that water pollution will not pose a major health risk during the Olympics, which will held in August 2016.

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According to a new study, drug resistant infections will kill an extra 10 million people a year worldwide – more than currently die from cancer – by 2050 unless action is taken.

They are currently implicated in 700,000 deaths each year.

The analysis, presented by British economist Jim O’Neill, said the costs would spiral to $100 trillion.

He was appointed by UK’s Prime Minister David Cameron in July to head a review of antimicrobial resistance.

The reduction in population and the impact on ill-health would reduce world economic output by between 2% and 3.5%.

The analysis was based on scenarios modeled by researchers Rand Europe and auditors KPMG.

They found that drug resistant E. coli, malaria and tuberculosis (TB) would have the biggest impact.Superbugs study

In Europe and the United States, antimicrobial resistance causes at least 50,000 deaths each year, they said. And left unchecked, deaths would rise more than 10-fold by 2050.

Jim O’Neill is best known for his economic analysis of developing nations and their growing importance in global trade.

He coined the acronyms BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and more recently MINT (Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey).

He said the impact would be mostly keenly felt in these countries.

The review team believes its analysis represents a significant underestimate of the potential impact of failing to tackle drug resistance, as it did not include the effects on healthcare of a world in which antibiotics no longer worked.

Joint replacements, Caesarean sections, chemotherapy and transplant surgery are among many treatments that depend on antibiotics being available to prevent infections.

The review team estimates that Caesarean sections currently contribute 2% to world GDP, joint replacements 0.65%, cancer drugs 0.75% and organ transplants 0.1%.

This is based on the number of lives saved, and ill-health prevented in people of working age.

Without effective antibiotics, these procedures would become much riskier and in many cases impossible.

The review team concludes that this would cost a further $100 trillion by 2050.

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