Hospital wastewater surveillance can detect antimicrobial-resistant pathogens: Scientists

At a CSIR-NCL symposium, experts emphasized hospital wastewater surveillance as crucial for early detection of antimicrobial resistance, a major global health threat.

Pune: Scientists at a one-day mini-symposium titled ‘War against antimicrobial resistance’ organised by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research-National Chemical Laboratory (CSIR-NCL) on December 22, have highlighted that hospital wastewater surveillance can detect antimicrobial-resistant pathogens and emerging variants several months before clinical outbreaks are reported. The findings underline the growing importance of environmental surveillance as a powerful early-warning tool in the global fight against antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

Hospital wastewater surveillance can detect antimicrobial-resistant pathogens: Scientists

Antimicrobial resistance is recognised as one of the most serious global public health challenges, currently responsible for an estimated 700,000 deaths each year. Projections suggest that if left unchecked, AMR could claim up to 10 million lives annually by 2050 while imposing an economic burden of nearly USD 100 trillion due to rising healthcare costs, reduced productivity, and impact on agriculture and food systems.

The symposium – organised as part of the global observance of World Antimicrobial Awareness Week (WAAW) – brought together clinicians, scientists, public health experts, policymakers and industry representatives to discuss the rapidly escalating threat posed by AMR across human, animal and environmental health sectors.

The inaugural lecture delivered by professor L S Shashidhara of the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bengaluru, discussed lessons from Covid-19 and stressed the need to strengthen India’s pathogen surveillance infrastructure to detect emerging threats at an early stage.

“Hospitals are convergence points for resistant pathogens. Wastewater monitoring can serve as an early warning system, enabling public health authorities to act before infections escalate. Delays in conventional diagnostics often force clinicians to rely on empirical antibiotic therapy, inadvertently accelerating resistance. Responsible antibiotic use, robust antimicrobial stewardship and coordinated surveillance, are essential to reducing treatment failures, hospital stays and mortality,” Dr Karyakarte said.

The first session of the symposium focused on environmental surveillance, examining AMR in dairy systems and wastewater networks. Dhanasekaran Shanmugam, chief scientist, CSIR-NCL, discussed antimicrobial resistance in dairy ecosystems, particularly bovine mastitis. He highlighted how resistant pathogens circulate between animals, humans and the environment within the One Health framework, underscoring risks associated with resistant bacteria in milk and challenges in detection and treatment.

In his address, Ashish Lele, director, CSIR-NCL, described AMR as a ‘silent pandemic’ with profound health and economic consequences. Lele outlined CSIR-NCL’s role in wastewater surveillance, including early detection of Covid-19 variants such as Omicron.

Concluding the symposium, speakers reiterated the urgent need for sustained, multi-sectoral collaboration to combat antimicrobial resistance. By highlighting the potential of hospital wastewater surveillance to detect threats well before clinical outbreaks, the event reinforced a key message of the WAAW namely ‘Act now – protect our present, secure our future’.

The CSIR–NCL mini-symposium thus positioned environmental surveillance as a critical pillar in India’s and the world’s strategy to contain antimicrobial resistance before it becomes an unmanageable public health crisis.