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Working with the UK Sepsis Trust, the society is calling for better recording of sepsis cases by hospitals.

With sepsis on the rise, the society claims it is vital that medics improve their knowledge of the illness so they can recognise the early signs, which include a high temperature and a fast heartbeat, and administer appropriate treatment.

Prof Bellamy, who is based at the Leeds Institute of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, said: "In time without new and effective antibiotics the problem will gradually escalate.

"For the first time in recent months I have seen in my own intensive care unit patients who are coming along who have infections which are pretty much resistant to all of the antibiotics, at least in normal doses.

"There is this spectre, if we don't develop new antibiotics and if we don't control the problem of antibiotic resistance effectively there is this spectre emerging of moving into a post antibiotic era, an era where simple surgical operations will become life threatening because there are no effective antibiotics available."