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LONDON, Dec 9 (Reuters) - Increased drug resistance in bacteria causing bloodstream infections, including against last-resort antibiotics, was seen in the first year of the coronavirus pandemic, a World Health Organization report based on data from 87 countries in 2020 showed. The effort, cost and time it takes to get an antibiotic approved and the limited return on investment have deterred drugmakers, as treatments must be priced cheaply and are designed to be used as little as possible to limit drug resistance. As a result, the lion's share of antibiotic development is taking place in a handful of labs of small biopharma companies as a majority of their larger counterparts focus on more lucrative markets. The authors of the WHO report said more research is needed to identify the reasons behind the jump in AMR in the period studied, and to what extent it is linked to the accelerated use of antibiotics during the pandemic.