France prescribes too many antibiotics to children, public health alert France

” Antibiotics are not automatic. All French people know the refrain. And yet, according to a report published this Wednesday by Public Health France and relayed by The Parisian, these drugs are still far too prescribed in our country. In 2021, approximately 700 prescriptions for antibiotics were issued per 1,000 inhabitants.

France thus ranks fourth among the European countries that consume the most antibiotics. Behind Greece, Romania and Bulgaria. A quasi-podium which we would have done well without. Antibiotics, discovered at the turn of the 1930s and 1940s and then used massively after the Second World War, are molecules that destroy the bacteria that cause disease or, at least, prevent them from developing.

Antibiotic resistance

But, over time, resistant bacteria emerge due to genetic mutations. By eliminating vulnerable bacteria, antibiotics have the perverse effect of letting their tougher counterparts take over the field. For ten years, antibiotics had reduced their presence in our prescriptions but with the arrival of winter, and its procession of seasonal viruses, they are making a comeback this year.

According to Public Health France, 125,000 infections with multi-resistant bacteria were detected in 2015 in the country, causing the death of more than 5,500 people. Toddlers are particularly affected by the resurgence of antibiotic prescriptions. If we observe a slight rebound for 15 to 64 year olds, the peak is particularly clear for 0 to 4 year olds.

Faced with this observation, Public Health France and Health Insurance launched a new awareness campaign on October 8 with this new slogan: “Antibiotics, good treatment, is first of all to use them well. »

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