Drug-resistant infections are expected to kill three people a minute over the next 25 years, according to a major new study. A total of 39 million people are predicted to die between 2025 and 2050 because of conditions that have become untreatable by antibiotics.

The study, published in The Lancet medical journal, lays bare the growing global threat of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which makes common infections such as sepsis and pneumonia unresponsive to the drugs typically used to treat them.

The figures projected by the report represent an alarming increase on previous deaths from AMR, which it counts at just over one million a year on average since 1990. By 2050, that number is forecast to have reached 1.91 million.

The report comes before a United Nations high level meeting on antimicrobial resistance next week, where world leaders will gather to discuss how to tackle the issue.

Dame Sally Davies, the UK special envoy on antimicrobial resistance, told TBIJ: “This landmark study confirms that the world is facing an antibiotic emergency, with devastating human costs for families and communities across the world.

“It substantiates our calls to all sectors to take decisive action now to save lives and save modern medicine for generations to come.”

The spread of superbugs is driven by the overuse of antibiotics, human consumption of which rose by almost half between 2000 and 2018. Often this happens when drugs are misprescribed by medical professionals or easily obtainable over the counter without a prescription. Despite this, most antibiotics are used in higher-income countries, and access to the drugs is still unequal.

Industrial farming practices are also a huge driver, with the global meat industry accounting for 73% of all antibiotics use around the world.

However, the highest death rates are seen in lower and middle income countries. Sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia suffer the most deaths due to AMR, with multi-drug resistant tuberculosis a particular threat.

The Lancet paper proposes systemic ways to tackle the issue, including better vaccine access, improved diagnostics, and incentivised funding for drug development

TBIJ has been reporting for almost a decade on the growing threat of AMR. TBIJ’s photojournalism project, showing how drug resistance is affecting lives around the world, will be exhibited in New York during the UN meeting.