: Pharmaceutical companies often prioritize drugs for chronic conditions over antibiotics because they are more profitable.
Responsible management of antibiotic resources. Summary Table: Antibiotic Resistance Overview Primary Cause Misuse/Overuse in humans and animals. Global Impact 1.27M direct deaths in 2019. Scope Affects all ages, healthcare, and agriculture. Major Risk Return of untreatable bacterial infections.
The socio-economic ramifications of an impending post-antibiotic era are catastrophic. The World Health Organization (WHO) warns that without coordinated international intervention, common infections could once again become major killers, potentially causing 10 million deaths annually by mid-century. Beyond the human toll, the economic burden will be devastating. Extended hospital stays due to treatment failures, the necessity for expensive second- and third-line therapies, and a sharp decline in workforce productivity could drain over $100 trillion from the global economy. Whole industries, from commercial animal husbandry to global tourism, face severe disruption if the safety nets of modern medicine fail.
Antibiotics have long been hailed as one of humanity's greatest medical breakthroughs, saving millions of lives and enabling complex surgical procedures. However, according to a recent World Health Organization (WHO) report, in 2023 alone, one in six laboratory-confirmed bacterial infections worldwide were resistant to standard antibiotic treatments. The WHO Director-General has warned that antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is now a major global health threat, outpacing the development of new medicines and threatening the very foundation of modern healthcare.
Combating this threat requires a multi-pronged approach (often termed a "One Health" approach): Global Impact 1
Bacterial AMR was directly responsible for 1.27 million global deaths in 2019.
Paragraph B defines horizontal gene transfer as a process "whereby one bacterium passes on the resistance gene from another without even needing to be its parent".
The IELTS Reading test frequently features academic passages on pressing scientific and societal issues, and is a prime example of a top-tier topic you are likely to encounter. Understanding the core concepts, vocabulary, and structural layout of this reading passage is essential for scoring a Band 7 or higher.
The economic implications of this biological threat are catastrophic. When first-line antibiotics fail, doctors must resort to second- or third-line drugs. These alternative medications are frequently significantly more expensive, require longer hospital stays, and carry a higher risk of severe side effects. For example, treating multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis requires months of painful intravenous therapy rather than a simple course of oral pills. The financial strain on global healthcare systems is immense, and the loss of labor productivity threatens to destabilize fragile economies. contaminating local water supplies
The text has five paragraphs, A–E. Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below.
Mitigating this global peril requires a multipronged, international framework. First, global surveillance networks must be strengthened to map resistance patterns in real-time, allowing local authorities to contain outbreaks of highly resistant strains before they cross international borders. Second, public health campaigns must correct widespread misconceptions regarding what antibiotics can realistically treat. Finally, governments must incentivize pharmaceutical innovation through economic "push and pull" mechanisms—such as market entry rewards—to decouple a drug's commercial profitability from its usage volume. Ultimately, the battle against antibiotic resistance is not a problem any single country can solve in isolation; it demands a unified, global commitment to preserve the efficacy of these fragile medical resources for generations to come. IELTS Reading Practice Questions Questions 1–6
Antibiotics are widely considered one of the greatest achievements of modern medicine. Following Alexander Fleming’s discovery of penicillin in 1928, these wonder drugs transformed healthcare, turning once-fatal illnesses like pneumonia, tuberculosis, and rheumatic fever into treatable conditions. However, the very success of these medications has bred complacency. Today, the world faces a silent pandemic: the rapid proliferation of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). According to global health estimates, drug-resistant infections directly cause over one million deaths annually, a figure projected to hit ten million per year by 2050 if current trends go unchecked.
Relating to or threatening human existence. and the food chain
Answer: Increased morbidity and mortality.
" discusses how the medical success story of antibiotics has become a major global concern. As bacteria evolve faster than we can develop new drugs, the misuse of current medicine is creating a crisis that could cause 10 million deaths annually by 2050.
Beyond human medicine, the agricultural sector bears massive responsibility for the acceleration of AMR. Globally, more antibiotics are consumed by livestock than by humans. In intensive farming, animals are routinely fed low doses of antibiotics, not to treat illness, but to promote growth and prevent infections in cramped, unhygienic conditions. This low-dose exposure acts as an evolutionary training ground for bacteria. These superbugs eventually leave the farms, contaminating local water supplies, soil, and the food chain, eventually infecting human populations.
While resistance is a natural evolutionary process, human activity has massively accelerated it. Common factors contributing to this crisis include: