Significant ethnic disparities exist in New Zealand in the incidence of various infectious diseases, including rheumatic fever, pneumonia and skin infections, all of which are substantially higher among Pacific and Māori peoples, when compared with people of European, Middle Eastern, Latin American or African, or Asian ethnicity. Antimicrobial stewardship interventions to improve antibiotic prescribing need to take account of these ethnic differences in the rates of infectious diseases. If these disparities are ignored, the health of some ethnic groups may be negatively affected. These researchers obtained demographic data on all patients registered with a general practice in New Zealand and on all community pharmacy antibacterial dispensings during 2015, in order to inform the development of antimicrobial stewardship interventions in New Zealand. The rate of community antibacterial dispensing for the total population surveyed was 3.01 dispensings per 1,000 population per day, and was 3.49 for Pacific, 3.23 for Māori, 3.02 for European, 2.70 for Middle Eastern, Latin American and African, and 2.35 for Asian people. Thus, even though the rates of many infectious diseases are very much higher among Pacific and Māori peoples than several other ethnicities in New Zealand, rates of antibiotic dispensings are only moderately higher for Pacific and Māori. In all ethnic groups, the rate of community antibacterial dispensing increased with increasing socioeconomic deprivation. Seasonal variation in antibacterial dispensing ranged between 34% in Asian people and 24% in European people.
