Antibiotic resistance is now a leading cause of death - urgent need for new therapies

Sepsis is a life-threatening organ dysfunction due to an uncontrolled immune response to infection - most often caused by bacteria. It is therefore most worrying that antibiotics, one of the most important weapons in the fight of deadly infections, are losing their effectiveness.

Recent analysis published in the renowned medical journal The Lancet, showed that antimicrobial resistance (AMR) was directly responsible for around 1.27 million direct deaths worldwide and associated with an estimate of 4.95 million deaths, in 2019. As a comparison: HIV/Aids and Malaria were estimated to have caused 860,000 and 640,000 deaths, respectively, in 2019.

The report highlights an urgent need to scale up action to combat AMR, and outlines immediate actions for policymakers that would help save lives and protect health systems. These include optimizing the use of existing antibiotics, taking greater action to monitor and control infections, and providing more funding to develop new antibiotics and treatments.

One such treatment that alleviates the burden of antibiotic usage under sepsis conditions while restoring immune functionality is being developed by hemotune AG. Our dedicated interdisciplinary team of chemists, biologists, engineers, immunologists, medical doctors and business executives, is working together to advance the disruptive technology for blood purification using magnetic nanoparticles. It is our goal to reduce length of stay of septic shock patients in the intensive care unit and reduce their mortality rates, which are currently between 35%-50%.