Citation

Jing Y, Kelton CM, Li X, Guo JJ. Pharmacoepidemiol. Drug Saf. 2007; 16(8): 928-932.

Affiliation

Division of Pharmacy Practice and Administrative Sciences, College of Pharmacy, University of Cincinnati Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2007, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1002/pds.1437

PMID

17590868

Abstract

In China, antibiotics are prescribed frequently, not only for bacterial infections but also for viruses, including the common cold, as well as other illnesses.12 Chinese people tend to believe that antibiotics are a cure for many diseases from skin infections to life-threatening lung ailments; and antibiotics are their first choice when they think about buying medication.3 Antibiotic abuse is particularly severe in small- and medium-sized towns and rural areas where doctors are not as well educated as in the large cities. Statistics from the World Health Organization reveal that the use of antibiotics in Chinese hospitals can be as high as 80 percent of overall cases, compared with the international average of 30 percent.3 Besides being one source of the specific public health disaster described in the remainder of this article, overprescribing generally leads to building up of resistance to antibiotics, making it more difficult to treat bacterial infections in the future.

Language: en