The British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (BSAC) supports the recommendations of the DRIVE-AB report, ‘Revitalizing the antibiotic pipeline’

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which concludes that further funding and leadership are required to stimulate innovation, drive sustainable use, and ensure global access to life-saving treatment.

The report, which was published today (24/01/18), calls for a 50% increase in research and development funding and the introduction of significant market entry rewards to dramatically increase the number of new antibiotics that are expected to reach the market.
Its authors estimate that the current level of ‘push’ funding (about $550 million/€470 million a year) is only likely to produce about four new classes of antibiotics in the next 30 years, while antibiotic resistance in some pathogens may more than double in the same period. As such, they estimate that $800 million (€680 million) is now needed annually to further boost research grants and pipeline coordination.

In addition, the DRIVE-AB report calculates that a market entry reward of $1 billion per antibiotic globally (in addition to unit sales revenues) could quadruple the number of new antibiotics coming to the market in the next 30 years.

It goes on to say that the first innovative antibiotic may receive regulatory approval as early as 2020 and the second in 2021 – but that without increased, and sustained, investment these initial breakthroughs could soon tail off.

It expects that at least $1.2 billion (€1.02 billion) per year will be necessary every year after 2022 (since a market entry reward of this value should result in about 18 qualifying antibiotics reaching the market in the 30 years after implementation of market entry rewards).

It suggests that the G20 Global R&D Collaboration Hub on AMR is best-placed to help implement the recommendations and so achieve the high-level coordination that is urgently required.