Health Check Ep 73: What to know about antimicrobial resistance

21:28 mins

Synopsis: Every first and third Wednesday of the month, The Straits Times helps you make sense of health matters that affect you.

The World Health Organisation has declared that antimicrobial resistance or AMR is one of the top 10 global public health threats facing humanity. AMR occurs when some of the germs that cause infections no longer respond to the drugs designed to kill them.

Infections then become harder or impossible to treat.

In this episode, ST senior health correspondent Joyce Teo speaks to Associate Prof Hsu Li Yang, who has a special interest in antibiotic resistance, about AMR. Prof Hsu is the Vice Dean of Global Health and Programme Leader of Infectious Diseases at the NUS Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health. And, with the worrisome Omicron spreading around the world, she also asked him how worrying the new variant is.

0:00 Highlights of conversation (click/tap above):

01:20 Why should you bother about antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in a pandemic?

03:42 The use of antibiotics in chickens, and what you should know about what you find in supermarkets

10:59 Lessons from the pandemic that can be applied to the control of AMR

15:05 Why is it difficult to develop new antibiotics for drug-resistant infections?

16:35 Will the new variant Omicron break through vaccine protection against severe disease?

Produced by: Joyce Teo ([email protected]), Ernest Luis and Fa'izah Sani

Edited by: Penelope Lee & Hadyu Rahim

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