New Delhi: Doctors say more and more viruses are growing resistant to antiviral antibiotics.
Researchers believe overuse of antibiotics and incomplete followup of prescription is reducing the power of the drugs.
As a result once curable diseases such as tuberculosis and malaria are rapidly mutating into aggressive strains. India's already seen multi-drug resistant TB, but now in Florida, a case of extreme drug resistant TB has surfaced.
"So antibiotic resistance is increasing and it's increasing at even faster rate than we were expecting," says Professor Herman Goossens, Coordinator at the European Surveillance on Antibiotic Consumption.
Oswaldo Juarez underwent treatment for tuberculosis over the last two years at a speciality hospital in Florida.
"They told me that my treatment is going to be two years and I had only one chance at life," Juarez said.
Doctors were shocked to find his strain of tuberculosis was almost entirely resistant to antibiotics.
They believe that the misuse of medication has helped viruses build up drug resistance worldwide.
"When you put a patient onto an antibiotic you kill the sensitive strains and they become colonised with resistant strains. This is known as the collateral damage," says microbiologist Dr Lynne Liebowitz
Animal farmers are also using more antibiotics on their livestock which is causing new drug-resistant infections, putting farmers and consumers at risk.
But whilst the drugs can help animals grow, they can also cause new drug-resistant infections - putting farmers and consumers at risk.
However, farmers say they need proof of the negative side-effects.
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