The development of antibiotics in the 1930’s and 1940’s has been regarded as one of the great medical advances of the 20th century. In recent years there has been growing concern worldwide in relation to the level of unnecessary and inappropriate antibiotic prescribing thereby increasing the risk of antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

In 1998 the European Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance System (EARSS) was established with funding from DG SANCO of the European Commission. It is an international network of national surveillance systems, which aims to collect comparable and reliable antimicrobial resistance data on invasive infections of Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Escherichia coli, and Enterococcus faecium/faecalis for public health action.

In Ireland EARSS commenced in 1999 and the Strategy for the control of Antimicrobial Resistance in Ireland (SARI) was launched in June 2001 by the Department of Health and Children (DoHC). One of the specific areas of SARI implementation is the surveillance of antibiotic consumption. The aim of this study was to identify total antibiotic consumption nationally between January 2000 and December 2003 using the General Medical Services (GMS) Scheme prescribing database.