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... Fungal infections are also adapting beyond the means of our medicine, causing a "silent pandemic" that needs to be addressed urgently, according to some researchers.

"The threat of fungal pathogens and antifungal resistance, even though it is a growing global issue, is being left out of the debate," explains molecular biologist Norman van Rhijn from the University of Manchester in the UK.

This September, the United Nations is hosting a meeting in New York City on antimicrobial resistance, which includes discussions on resistant bacteria, fungi, viruses, or parasites.

Ahead of this event, van Rhijn and an international team of scientists are urging governments, the research community, and the pharmaceutical industry to "look beyond just bacteria."

Fungal infections, they write in a correspondence for The Lancet, are left out of too many initiatives to tackle antimicrobial resistance.

Without urgent attention and action, some particularly nasty fungal infections, which already infect 6.5 million a year and claim 3.8 million lives annually, could become even more dangerous.

"The disproportionate focus on bacteria is concerning because many drug resistance problems over the past decades were the result of invasive fungal diseases, which are largely under-recognized by the community and governments alike," write van Rhijn and his colleagues, who hail from institutions in China, the Netherlands, Austria, Australia, Spain, the UK, Brazil, the US, India, Trkiye, and Uganda. ...