The Challenge
Antimicrobials are used to treat many devastating diseases, from malaria and tuberculosis to gonorrhoea and E. coli. However, the efficacy of these crucial medicines is now under threat because of misuse and overuse, providing a breeding ground for drug resistance in bacteria, viruses and fungi. By 2050, antimicrobial resistant diseases could cause 10 million deaths globally every year. The world’s ability to treat disease is under threat. Obstacles to effective treatment include lack of research for new medicines and weak surveillance and regulatory systems.
This is a problem that health actors will not be able to solve alone. Controlling antimicrobial resistance requires collaboration and buy-in from leaders across the health, environment, business, agriculture and policy sectors. Antimicrobial resistance is squarely a ‘One Health’ issue.
The Approach
GHS is committed to bringing this issue to the top of the global agenda, working with the WHO, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and partners to release the latest data and recommendations from worldwide experts on the issue.
Launch of the IACG report in April 2019 with Professor Junshi Chen, WHO Deputy Director-General Dr. Zsuzsanna Jakab, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Deputy Secretary-General Amina J Mohammed, Professor Dame Sally Davies and Dr. Anthony So.
The Impact
In April 2019, GHS supported the launch of the seminal report of the UN Interagency Coordination Group on Antimicrobial Resistance (IACG), which was covered by over 200 news articles, including coverage in The New York Times and an op-ed authored by WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed in The Telegraph.
GHS has also supported the OIE to highlight how regulating antimicrobial use in animals is critical to this race against the clock, helping to launch a report on progress at the global level in February 2019 and prepare for a conference on antimicrobial resistance in October 2018 in Morocco.
