Hundreds join Protecting our Antibiotics campaign

Health organisations in Wolverhampton are actively working to spread the message about the need to use antibiotics responsibly to ensure they can continue to be effective in the future.

Setting broken bones, basic operations and even chemotherapy all require antibiotics that work.

But there is now a growing list of infections such as pneumonia and blood poisoning that are becoming harder to treat because some of the drugs previously used no longer work.

In Wolverhampton, awareness is being raised through the Wolverhampton Together – Protecting our Antibiotics campaign.

This has seen the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT) join forces with Wolverhampton CCG, Wolverhampton council's public health team and NHS England.

They are encouraging both the public and health workers to show their support by signing up to become an Antibiotic Guardian and make a pledge about how they can personally prevent infections and make better use of antibiotics. So far more than 350 people have signed up.

New Cross Hospital boss David Loughton said: "This campaign is important because over a period of years we've seen the number of antibiotics that effectively work on patients going down.

"We're now seeing the effects of 25 to 30 years ago when people would go to GPs and be given antibiotics when they didn't really need them.

"If we don't doing do something about it now, we will have less and less antibiotics that work and we will not be able to treat patients properly."

Ros Jervis, director of public health for Wolverhampton, said: "There is an expectation among some patients that if they go to their GP, they will be going to be given antibiotics.

"This is what we want to change. Antibiotics don't work against infections caused by viruses so it's no good taking them for a cold.

"We want to encourage patients to self-manage their symptoms and have the confidence to go to their pharmacy first for help."

The hospital trust's head of nursing Vanessa Whatley, who is leading the Wolverhampton campaign, said they also wanted to encourage the responsible use of antibiotics when they are prescribed.

She added: "Antibiotics should be used to treat bacterial infections, they should never be shared with friends and family and the full course of treatment should be completed."

The Express & Star has also backed the campaign. Editor Keith Harrison said: "We never know when we, or our loved ones, might require antibiotics in the future and when we need them we want them to work."

Visit antibioticguardian.com to find out more.