Labour MP Allison Gardner describes suicidal ordeal from chronic UTIs and calls for better testing and treatment

Labour MP Allison Gardner said chronic urinary tract infections left her in such severe pain that she contemplated taking her own life and even considered having her bladder removed, in an interview on ITV’s This Morning. Gardner, who was diagnosed with chronic UTI in 2023 after more than a decade of symptoms, used her account to call for better testing, longer courses of antibiotics and greater recognition of persistent female urinary infections.

Gardner told presenters that at her worst she could not get off the sofa, used frozen peas and other extreme measures to try to ease the pain, and that the condition “just becomes all you think about.” She has previously spoken in Westminster in May 2025 about how women’s medical conditions are often “misunderstood, under-researched and underfunded.”

Specialists and campaign groups say Gardner’s experience echoes a broader problem in the diagnosis and management of recurrent and chronic UTIs in women. Dr Catriona Anderson, a consultant who treats recurrent urogynaecological infections and founder of the Focus Medical Clinic, said standard NHS urine tests miss a substantial proportion of infections and that short courses of antibiotics can leave bacteria embedded in the bladder wall.

“NHS tests only pick up around 60 per cent of infections,” Dr Anderson said. She described how bacteria that survive inadequate treatment can form sticky biofilms in the bladder wall, making infections harder to eradicate and often requiring months of tailored treatment to control symptoms.

The charity Chronic Urinary Tract Infection Campaign estimates roughly 1.7 million women in the UK suffer from persistent UTIs. Acute UTIs are the most common bacterial infection in women and around half of women will experience at least one episode in their lifetime, with symptoms such as abdominal pain, frequent urgent urination and a burning sensation.

Current NHS guidance recommends three-day courses of antibiotics for uncomplicated UTIs in women and children, although studies cited by some specialists indicate a five-day course is more effective for many patients. For recurrent or chronic infections, clinicians sometimes prescribe longer suppressive regimens, including low-dose antibiotics for months, but treatment strategies vary and long courses raise concerns about increasing antimicrobial resistance.

Melissa Kramer, chief executive of the charity LIVE UTI Free, said there are three main issues affecting women with recurrent and chronic UTIs: inaccurate testing methods, antibiotic courses that are not long enough to eradicate bacteria, and a lack of formal recognition of chronic UTI as a distinct medical condition.

Gardner, who trained in molecular biology and has worked at the NHS spending watchdog Nice, told the programme she believed repeated short antibiotic courses had contributed to cycles of partial clearance and recurrence, leaving resistant organisms behind. “I truly believe that all I was doing was breeding antimicrobial resistant bacteria for UTIs,” she said.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has approved a new oral antibiotic, gepotidacin (marketed as Blujepa), to treat uncomplicated UTIs — the first new oral option for the condition in nearly 30 years, regulators said. The MHRA said new options are important as drug-resistant bacteria increase and can lead to treatment failure and complications such as sepsis or kidney damage.

However, doctors in England cannot yet prescribe the drug until the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) completes an assessment of its clinical effectiveness and cost-effectiveness. Gardner said she was concerned that decisions about availability would balance cost against patients’ quality of life.

An NHS spokesperson said the health service is working to improve the way women’s health concerns are handled: “Too often in the NHS we hear of women whose health concerns have been dismissed and we're actively addressing this through education training, improving our services, including establishing women's health hubs.”

Clinicians treating persistent urinary symptoms urge greater awareness among health professionals that standard dipstick and midstream urine culture tests can fail to detect some chronic infections and that a tailored diagnostic and treatment pathway may be needed. Dr Anderson said that with more sensitive testing and appropriate antibiotic selection and duration, many patients’ symptoms can improve, though the process can take months.

Campaigners and some specialists are calling for clearer clinical pathways, investment in improved diagnostics and research into treatments for chronic UTI, while also emphasising the need to monitor and manage antimicrobial resistance. The availability of new drugs such as gepotidacin will depend on regulatory and health-technology assessments as well as funding decisions that health services make in the coming months.