Most of the clinically important antibiotics are now less effective at killing disease-causing bacteria than the last few years, shows the latest surveillance data of the government.
The ongoing surveillance which started in 2017 on 18 antibiotics used against 10 pathogens has found that 11 antibiotics are now less effective.
An alarming situation is continuing to worsen mostly because of the "irrational" use of antibiotics, said Prof Zakir Hossain Habib, who leads the study being conducted by the Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research.
The surveillance being done at nine medical college hospitals, found all 18 antibiotics were ineffective in curing infections caused by 6 percent of the examined bacteria, up from 5 percent last year. These bacteria are called "superbugs".
"If this continues, our Intensive Care Units will be worthless. Doctors will be helpless against the superbugs," said Prof Zakir, also the chief scientific officer at the IEDCR.
The drugs were tested against the bacteria responsible for urinary tract infections, septicaemia, diarrhoea, pneumonia and wound infections and some other ailments.
As the findings were revealed at an event at the IEDCR auditorium in the capital yesterday, experts said "irrational use" or the unnecessary use of "higher class" antibiotics has been causing the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Antibiotics are classified as the "access group" which is prescribed for primary infections, the "watch group" for high-resistance bacteria, and the "reserve group" for infections that can't be prevented or treated with drugs from the other groups.
The ineffectiveness of antibiotics in killing microorganisms like bacteria, viruses and parasites is called antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which is a global cause for concern.
AMR results in the death of about 3,500 people every day. More than 1.2 million people -- and potentially millions more -- died in 2019 as a direct result of antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections, according to a study published in medical journal Lancet early this year.
A 2021 study by the Disease Control unit at the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) revealed that higher-class (watch and reserve) antibiotics were being used in 70-80 percent of the cases in the country. But the World Health Organisation recommends keeping the usage within 40 percent.
According to the IEDCR study, ineffectiveness of four out of six critically important antibiotics listed by the World Health Organisation has increased up to 84 percent during the last one year.
The list includes Ceftazidime, Cefixime, Cefepime and Ceftriaxone. Of the two other critically important antibiotics -- ineffectiveness of Azithromycin fell to 53 percent from 55 percent while Ciprofloxacin remained at 66 percent.
But Carbapenem -- considered a last-resort antibiotic -- is now 60 percent ineffective, up from 44 percent last year, according to the report.
Addressing yesterday's event as the chief guest, Prof Ahmedul Kabir, additional director general (administration) of the DGHS, said, "At first, physicians should be made aware of the perils of prescribing antibiotics indiscriminately."
Prof Nitish Debnath, team lead of the Fleming Fund Country Grant, said, "This is a crisis for all of us and we can overcome it if we work together."
At the beginning of the event, prizes were given among university and medical college students who won an AMR awareness competition.
Daniel Novak, first secretary of the Embassy of Sweden in Dhaka; Mohamed Ramzy Ismail, representative of WHO Bangladesh; and Prof Mushtuq Hussain, consultant of the IEDCR attended the event presided over by IEDCR Director Tahmina Shirin.
