Tag: Lifelong antibiotics

While most antibiotic courses are short-term, a small proportion of patients worldwide require long-term, and sometimes lifelong, suppressive antibiotic therapy. This occurs in specific and complex medical scenarios where the goal is not to cure, but to manage and suppress chronic or incurable infections, and helps explain why would someone need to be on antibiotics for the rest of their life.

In the United States, there are nearly one antibiotic prescription per person annually [1.4.1]. While most are short-term, some conditions necessitate continuous use. So, **why would someone be on antibiotics for life?** It's often to prevent or suppress persistent, hard-to-treat infections [1.2.3, 1.2.7].