PATIENTS could end up turning to black market antibiotics after a crackdown by health chiefs, a community leader fears.

It follows concerns internationally that an explosion in the use of antibiotics is leading to common conditions like pneumonia developing resistance.

Swindon NHS Clinical Commissioning Group, which pays for NHS health services in Swindon and Shrivenham, is introducing new systems which should help cut the number of antibiotics prescribed in the town.

But some have raised concerns about the crackdown.

Tom Jeffery of the Park North Forum Group said at Swindon CCG’s annual general meeting yesterday: “We’ve been finding that for some of our members doctors will not give them antibiotics now and they’ve got to rely on going to the chemist to get other prescriptions for it.

“I’m worried that there are a lot of black market antibiotics on the internet. We’re very worried [our members] are going into these units and they’re finding it, whether or not it’s the right antibiotic they’re supposed to be given.”

Dr Peter Mack, a Moredon GP and clinical chair of Swindon CCG, played down the threat of black market antibiotics in the town: “I’ve heard of people going on the internet and buying antibiotics, but it’s not a big issue.”

He told the AGM audience: “What we’re endeavouring to do is put systems in place in our GP practices and working with pharmacists so people are given antibiotics most appropriately. That’s the crucial thing.

“We want the right treatment at the right time. What we are trying to avoid is too many antibiotics being given in inappropriate situations, because that’s the thing that drives antibiotic resistance and the rise of Clostridium difficile and the inability of antibiotics of the future to work.

“There will be people who in the past may have been given antibiotics in a circumstance we would now regard as inappropriate. They wouldn’t be given them today because practice and good custody of antibiotics has improved and changed.

In Swindon last year, doctors saw 46 cases of Clostridium difficile, a bacterial infection whose spread is linked to antibacterial resistance and which causes vomiting and diarrhoea.

Dr Mack said: “There’s really good evidence that certain groups of relatively commonly used antibiotics are associated with higher levels of C.diff, for example. There are alternatives and the systems we are putting in place are nudging clinicians to think about what they’re using rather than doing the habitual easy thing.

“I would hope that in two years’ time, when any one of us is in a position where we might need an antibiotic we can also at the same time have a system that says, ‘Yes, your inflammation markers are suggesting this is the right thing to do’.”