Growing Cases of Antimicrobial Resistance to Augment the Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing Market Growth

 

Antimicrobial susceptibility testing is proving to be major breakthrough in detecting drug-related infections. It helps detect resistance, confirm susceptibility, and guide the selection of patient therapy. Moreover, it helps the doctor in drug choice and dosage for difficult-to-treat infections. Antibiotic resistance is a major global health concern due to antibiotic misuse.

Antimicrobial susceptibility testing provides minimum inhibitory concentrations within hours at reasonable cost, enabling rapid determination of effective targeted therapies, resulting in few laboratory tests, short hospital stays, and decrease in mortality and morbidity along with associated healthcare expenses.

Market Dynamics:

The growing cases of antimicrobial resistance worldwide are expected to propel the growth of the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market. For instance, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), antimicrobial resistance was one of the ten threats to global health in 2019. Moreover, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), each year, more than 2.8 million antibiotic-resistant infections occur in the United States, and more than 35,000 people die as a result.

Moreover, the increasing consumption of antibiotics and the increasing number of multidrug resistance cases (which develops resistance among the population) is expected to fuel the growth of the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market. Antimicrobial resistance occurs when fungi, viruses, bacteria, and parasites change over time and no longer respond to medicines, making infections harder to treat and increasing the risk of disease spread, severe illness, and death.

The emergence of COVID-19 is also expected to offer lucrative growth opportunities for players in the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market. For instance, in January 2021, Israeli emergency medical services organization United Hatzalah (UH) planned to roll out COVID-19 rapid diagnostic kits in partnership with Israeli biotech startup Nanosynex, as part of a pilot initiative to ramp up mass testing efforts affordably and efficiently.

However, requirement of regulatory approval/clearance by respective government authorities, such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is expected to hamper the growth of the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market.

Competitive Analysis:

Major players operating in the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market are Merck KGaA, Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. Dickinson and Company, Becton, Danaher Corporation, Resistell AG, Creative Diagnostics, Alifax Holding S.p.A., HiMedia Laboratories, and bioMérieux S.A.

Major players in the market are focused on developing novel antimicrobial susceptibility tests to improve the health and well-being of patients. For instance, in January 2021, the health and biotech company, MedFluid developed the fastest, first-in-class antimicrobial susceptibility test that would assist in providing precise medical prescriptions to improve the health and well-being of patients.