Science ministers discuss the growing threat of antimicrobial resistance

Science ministers from the G8 group of developed countries meeting to discuss the threat of antimicrobial resistance were shocked at the scale of the problem, England’s chief medical officer has said.

Sally Davies, England’s chief medical officer, spoke to the BMJ after she addressed science ministers and leading scientists at the Royal Society in London, ahead of the G8 leaders’ summit in Northern Ireland. A statement signed by all eight ministers after the meeting described antimicrobial resistance as a “major health security challenge of the 21st century.”

Davies was asked to speak at the meeting after she warned of the threat posed by antimicrobial resistance in her annual report published in …