Doctors are to be told to stop prescribing antibiotics for coughs, colds and sore throats because over-use of the drugs is fuelling the spread of killer hospital superbugs. Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary, says it is time to end the unnecessary use of penicillin and other commonly-prescribed pills, which cost the NHS £1.7 billion a year. Using antibiotics too liberally has led to bugs such as MRSA becoming resistant to treatment with the drugs. Most colds, coughs and flu are caused by viruses, which cannot be treated with antibiotics anyway, Mr Johnson points out. Announcing a £270 million campaign against superbugs, to be launched next month, he says it is vital that doctors adopt ‘less of a knee-jerk reaction to prescribing’. The campaign, called Clean, Safe Care, will also include an extra £45 million for hospitals to spend on infection control nurses or antibiotic specialist pharmacists. All patients going into hospital will be screened for MRSA by 2009. Staff have already been told they must be ‘bare below the elbows’ to help prevent the spread of infection between patients and all hospitals should undergo a ‘deep clean’ by March this year, although experts have dismissed […]