Intel Chain

# HEALTH: The Silent Cost of Antibiotic Resistance Antibiotic resistance kills approximately 1.27 million people annually worldwide—more deaths than from malaria or tuberculosis individually. Since Fleming's penicillin discovery in 1928, overuse in agriculture (70% of antibiotics sold in the US go to livestock) and healthcare has accelerated bacterial evolution, creating "superbugs" like MRSA. Without intervention, projections estimate 10 million annual deaths by 2050, potentially reversing decades of medical progress where routine surgeries and childbirth become life-threatening. This matters because resistance erodes the foundation of modern medicine—if we lose effective antibiotics, we lose transplants, chemotherapy support, and emergency care as we know it.