B2IELTS-style · Band 5.5–6.5Reading18 min

IELTS Reading: Antibiotics and Public Health

Antibiotics and public health

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IELTS Academic Reading • B2 ⏱️ Suggested Time: 18 minutes

Antibiotics and Public Health

Explore Alexander Fleming's 1928 discovery, his 1945 warning, and global surveillance data on antimicrobial resistance.

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How to use this lesson

For Teachers

1. Set an 18-minute timer and ask students to read the passage carefully before touching the questions.

2. Check answers together using the exact Evidence and Why formula provided in each key.

For Learners

1. First, read the whole passage once to understand the main story of penicillin and resistance.

2. Next, answer the 10 questions in order and underline the proof in the text.

Reading Passage

Antibiotics and Public Health

Passage Text

In 1928 the scientist Alexander Fleming noticed that bacteria in one of his culture bowls had stopped growing near a mould. He decided that the mould contained a substance that works against bacteria. This substance is called penicillin. Fleming shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

In his Nobel lecture on 11 December 1945, Fleming said that it is not difficult to make microbes resistant to penicillin in the laboratory by exposing them to amounts too small to kill them, and that the same thing has sometimes happened in the body. He warned that if people could buy penicillin in shops, some might take too little and make the microbes resistant.

The World Health Organization (WHO) reported in October 2025 that about one in six laboratory-confirmed bacterial infections worldwide in 2023 were resistant to antibiotics. Its data came from over 100 countries. In 2019 the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated that antibiotic-resistant bacteria and fungi cause more than 2.8 million infections and 35,000 deaths in the United States each year.

The writer's own cautious view, hedged ('I think', 'it seems'): these facts seem to show that the problem was named very early, and I think the recent figures suggest that resistance is now common. The facts here do not show which patients or countries are most affected.

Part 1 • Questions 1–3

Questions 1–3

Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in the Reading Passage?

YES — if the statement agrees with the claims of the writer

NO — if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer

NOT GIVEN — if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

1. Fleming observed that bacteria stopped reproducing when they were close to a mould.

____ YES ____ NO ____ NOT GIVEN

2. Fleming objected to shops selling penicillin at high prices to the public.

____ YES ____ NO ____ NOT GIVEN

3. Fleming believed that producing drug-resistant microbes in a laboratory was an extremely complicated process.

____ YES ____ NO ____ NOT GIVEN

Part 2 • Questions 4–5

Questions 4–5

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

4. According to Fleming, why could buying penicillin in shops lead to drug resistance?

____ A. Customers might purchase raw culture moulds instead of purified medication. ____ B. Consumers might take quantities that are too small to kill off the bacteria. ____ C. Stored medicines lose their antibacterial power before patients can consume them. ____ D. Shopkeepers might distribute unapproved experimental substances without a prescription.

5. What is the writer's cautious view regarding the recent statistical data on resistance?

____ A. The data provides a comprehensive geographical map of the most vulnerable nations. ____ B. The findings prove that Fleming was overly pessimistic about public health dangers. ____ C. The figures imply resistance is widespread, though they leave key demographic impacts unclear. ____ D. The statistics confirm that fungal infections have surpassed bacterial illnesses worldwide.

Part 3 • Questions 6–7

Questions 6–7

The Reading Passage has four paragraphs, A–D. Which paragraph contains the following information?

Choose the correct letter, A–D, for each question.

6. data showing the worldwide proportion of confirmed bacterial infections resistant to antibiotics

____ Paragraph A ____ Paragraph B ____ Paragraph C ____ Paragraph D

7. an account of the initial observation of mould halting the development of bacteria

____ Paragraph A ____ Paragraph B ____ Paragraph C ____ Paragraph D

Part 4 • Questions 8–10

Questions 8–10

Complete the summary below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

The Scale and Unknowns of Microbial Resistance

Surveillance figures demonstrate that antimicrobial resistance poses a heavy toll. According to estimates published by the CDC in 2019, drug-resistant bacteria and fungi account for more than 35,000

8. ____ (Type word...)

in the United States every year. Although Alexander Fleming was already alerting the scientific community to this danger when he accepted his 1945

9. ____ (Type word...)

lecture, the problem has continued to escalate. Nevertheless, current public records still do not make clear precisely which individual patient groups or

10. ____ (Type word...)

suffer the heaviest consequences today.

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