2025 Global Antibiotic Resistance Surveillance Report

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The World Health Organization (WHO) has published a new report, Global Antibiotic Resistance Surveillance Report 2025. According to the report, by 2023, one in six laboratory-confirmed bacterial infections causing common infections in people worldwide will be resistant to antibiotic treatment. Between 2018 and 2023, antibiotic resistance increased in more than 40% of monitored pathogen-antibiotic combinations, with an average annual increase of 5-15%. Data reported by more than 100 countries to the WHO Global Antimicrobial Resistance and Use Surveillance System (GLASS) warns that increasing resistance to essential antibiotics is posing a growing threat to global health.

The new report presents, for the first time, estimates of the prevalence of resistance for 22 antibiotics used to treat infections of the urinary tract, gastrointestinal tract, and bloodstream, as well as antibiotics used to treat gonorrhea. This report covers eight common bacterial pathogens. Acinetobacter spp., They showed cool-headedness., Klebsiella pneumoniae, Neisseria gonorrheanon-typhoid fever Salmonella spp., Shigella spp., Staphylococcus aureus and streptococcal pneumonia – Each has been linked to one or more of these infections.

Key Results

• National participation in GLASS has quadrupled since 2016, but regional disparities remain.: Since 2016, 110 countries, including 3 regions, have submitted AMR data to GLASS. In 2023, 104 countries reported data, an increase of more than 300% compared to the 25 countries that reported in 2016, the first year of data collection.
• Resistance is widespread across the world, with wide regional differences.: By 2023, approximately 1 in 6 laboratory-confirmed bacterial infections worldwide will be caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Intermediate resistance was most common in urinary tract infections (approximately 1 in 3 people) and bloodstream infections (1 in 6 people), and less commonly in gastrointestinal infections (1 in 15 people) and urogenital gonorrheal infections (1 in 125 people). Resistance was most frequent in Southeast Asia and the Eastern Mediterranean (nearly 1 in 3 infections), followed by Africa (1 in 5). All were above the global median (Figure 2). Resistance was less frequent in the European region (1 in 10) and least frequent in the Western Pacific region (1 in 11), indicating wide regional disparities.
• Trends in AMR indicate an increasing threat from Gram-negative bacterial pathogens.: AMR increased in 40% of pathogenic antibiotic combinations monitored for global time trends from 2018 to 2023, with annual relative increases ranging from 5% to 15% depending on the combination.
• Settings with lower AMR surveillance coverage report higher levels of AMR.: The incidence of AMR is highest in countries with low surveillance coverage. In fact, there is a strong inverse correlation between a country’s AMR surveillance coverage and its median reported AMR.
• Antibiotic resistance disproportionately affects LMICs and vulnerable health systems, creating a syndemic.: Socioeconomic factors and the strength of the healthcare system are key determinants of the burden of AMR, with the frequency of AMR increasing when healthcare systems are weak. In fact, a strong inverse correlation was found between the UHC (Universal Health Coverage) service coverage indices.

Priority of Action

• Countries must overcome structural and operational barriers to data collection, improve the coverage and representativeness of national AMR surveillance systems, use data for decision-making, and ensure timely sharing of national AMR data to GLASS by 2030, in line with the commitments set out in the 2024 UN General Assembly Political Declaration on AMR.
• Countries should implement an integrated package of interventions, including strengthening infection prevention and control, water, sanitation, immunization, antimicrobial stewardship, and laboratory services, in line with WHO’s people-centred approach.
• Countries must improve their capacity to conduct AMR surveillance, including through greater representation and strengthening laboratories and data systems.
• Countries must reduce the use of AWARe “Watch” antibiotics and increase the use of “Access” antibiotics by at least 70% by 2030 to achieve the targets set in the 2024 Political Declaration on AMR. At the same time, in settings where multidrug resistance is documented, the next treatment approach should be organized by expanding access, ensuring the judicious use of “back-up” antibiotics.
• Countries must address AMR through a broad range of strategies to strengthen health systems, enhance resilience, and expand social protection, such as UHC and multi-sectoral initiatives, with equity and access at their core.