The fight to antimicrobic resistance is showing its first results, as demonstrated by the data on sales of veterinary antibiotics from 25 European countries released by the European Medicines Agency. According to the thirteenth annual report on the European Surveillance of Veterinary Antimicrobial Consumption (ESVAC): 2009 – 2023, overall sales of these medicines decreased by 53% between 2011 and 2022, a trend which translates into a lower risk of bacteria developing resistance in people and animals. Many classes of antibiotics considered critically important in human medicine due to their veterinary use showed a marked decrease of sales over the same period. Third- and fourth- generation cephalosporins dropped by 49%, polymyxins by 81%, fluoroquinolones by 25%, and sales of other quinolones dropped by 90%. These classes of antibiotics play an important role in mitigating the potential risk to public health, according to the Antimicrobial Advice ad hoc Expert Group (AMEG) categorisation. The ESVAC project was launched in 2009, with the participation of the first 9 volunteering European countries, and it counts today 31 participating countries. After the closure of the project in 2023, the ESVAC concept was integrated into the EU legislation, making the collection of data mandatory for all EU countries. The first comprehensive report based on sales data for 2023 will be published in 2025.
Source: EMA