Antibiotic resistance stems from insufficient incentives for patients, physicians, hospitals, and drug companies to do the right thing.
Dates of Project: May 2005 to December 2011
Field of Work: Antibiotic resistance
Problem Synopsis: Modern medicine depends on antibiotics to control bacterial infections, but pathogens resistant to antibiotics have emerged and spread rapidly. The Institute of Medicine and many others have sounded urgent calls to address this growing threat, yet policy-makers have done little to respond.
Synopsis of the Work: Extending the Cure researchers evaluated antibiotics and resistance of them, and proposed incentives to make the best use of existing antibiotics and encourage the discovery of new ones. The researchers framed the problem as one of “the commons”: antibiotics are a shared resource like clean air and safe drinking water, and any use of these drugs diminishes their overall effectiveness.