Situation Analysis and Recommendations: Antibiotic Use and Resistance in Kenya

In Kenya, the bacterial infections that contribute most to human disease are often those in which re-­‐sistance is most evident. Examples are multidrug-­‐resistant enteric bacterial pathogens such as typhoid, diarrhoeagenic Escherichia coli and invasive non-­‐typhi salmonella, penicillin-­‐resistant Streptococcus pneu-­‐moniae, vancomycin-­‐resistant enterococci, methicillin-­‐resistant Staphylococcus aureus and multidrug-­‐re-­‐sistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Resistance to medicines commonly used to treat malaria is of particu-­‐lar concern, as is the emerging resistance to anti-­‐HIV drugs. Often, more expensive medicines are required to treat these infections, and this becomes a major challenge in resource-­‐poor settings.