Study Says Campaigns to Reduce Antibiotic Use in the U.S. Cant Compete with Drug Advertising

Regional public education campaigns in the United States to promote more appropriate use of antibiotics among outpatients are underfunded and seldom evaluated for effectiveness, concludes a study presented at the 49th Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy held last month. The study was published in the British Medical Journal.

"The main problems in the U.S. are that the programs are not adequately funded or evaluated," said Benedikt Huttner, the study’s lead author. Many operate on $100,000 a year or less, which pays for little more than the salary of a program administrator. "There is very little money left over for the interventions themselves," Huttner added.

Reference: BMJ 2009;339:b3785