Plan to curb superbugs highlights wastewater

UK and Northern Ireland governments have committed to tackling the growing threat of bacteria and other microbes that are resistant to antibiotics, and emphasised the need for improvements in wastewater treatment among other measures to arrest the spread of so-called superbugs.

In a recently published, five-year plan to address the issue of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), Confronting antimicrobial resistance 2024 to 2029, the authors have highlighted the need for improvements in waste management and water treatment. They warn that, to address the threat of accelerating transmission of drug-resistant microbes into the environment, “stewardship initiatives to reduce pollution from hospital and community wastewater, agricultural activities and antimicrobial manufacturing need to be developed and implemented.”

The UK government and devolved administrations, along with the Irish government, have pledged to “implement effective waste management, wastewater treatment methods and agrochemical stewardship to minimise dissemination of AMR and AMR-driving chemicals into the environment.”

In the current five-year plan document, they said a Policy Innovation Research Unit appraisal of the first such plan to 2024 found that “co-ordination across the governments of the UK and with the academic community and the water industry could be improved.” The need, they said, was driven by “the relationship between the environment and public health, and the environment and animal health.”

The plan document outlines examples of interventions that have been developed or implemented, including: 

• new legally binding targets in England to reduce pollution from farming, wastewater and abandoned metal mines; 

• increasing monitoring of storm overflows in England from 10% in 2015, to over 90% today;

• establishing the Antibiotics and Pharmaceuticals Monitoring Programme in Northern Ireland to identify sources of AMR-driving chemicals in the environment;

• testing for antibiotic resistance in bacteria at bathing water sites in Scotland and producing a publicly accessible visualisation tool to present the data; 

• researching AMR genes and AMR-driving chemicals in wastewater and sludge at different types of wastewater treatment plants in England through the UK Chemical Investigations Programme; and

• development of pilot AMR surveillance in river catchments through a four-year, UK-wide and cross-government programme, Pathogen Surveillance in Agriculture, Food and Environment (Path-Safe).