A Belgian became the first fatal victim of a drug-resistant “superbug” originating in South Asia, reinforcing fears it could spread worldwide after infecting dozens of people in Britain and Australia.

The victim was infected by the bug while being treated in a hospital in Pakistan and died in June, a doctor from the Brussels hospital where he had been treated told Belgian media yesterday.

“He was involved in a car accident during a trip to Pakistan. He was hospitalised with a major leg injury and then repatriated to Belgium, but he was already infected,” the doctor said.

Despite being administered colistin, a powerful antibiotic, the patient died, the doctor said.

A second Belgian picked up the bug after being hospitalised after an accident during a trip to his native Montenegro, but recovered following treatment back in Belgium in July, another expert said yesterday.

“The epicentre of the presence of this bacteria seems to be India and Pakistan, but it appears through contact and travel, its spread is becoming wider,” Youri Glupczynski, a bacteriologist from the University of Leuven, saud.

The superbug – found in bacteria containing the New Delhi metallo-lactamase-1 (NDM-1) gene – was first identified last year in a Swedish patient admitted to hospital in India.

British medical journal The Lancet reported this week that bacteria containing the NDM-1 gene had been found in 37 Britons who had received medical treatment in South Asia.

The report, which said health tourists visiting South Asia risked infection and warned the superbug could spread, sparked a furious response from India.

“To link this with the safety of surgery in hospitals in India and citing isolated examples to show that... India is not a safe place to visit, is wrong,” the health ministry said in a statement yesterday.

However it also emerged yesterday that a team of Indian researchers had warned about the superbug in March.