A global effort to fight resistant pathogens
Selective agar plate on which a multi-resistant Escherichia coli strain grows.
The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research is joining forces with international partners in a new initiative to promote research into antimicrobial resistance (AMR). The aim is to fight pathogens that have become resistant to existing antibiotics. The starting signal for the Global Antimicrobial Resistance Research and Development Hub, or Global AMR R&D Hub for short, has been given on 22 May 2018 in Geneva. Initially, the secretariat of the Global AMR R&D Hub will be based in Berlin, at the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF).
The Global AMR R&D Hubcurrently counts 18 members, including countries such as Russia, China, the United States and France and organizations such as the Bill&Melinda Gates Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the European Commission. Representatives of the members will meet ona regular basis to identify important research and development tasks and coordinate the employment of resources. The aim is to provide more effective funding for research and development of new treatments and diagnostics for resistant pathogens. A further aspect is how to enable as many people as possible to benefit from these new developments.
The inappropriate use of antibiotics has resulted in more and more bacterial strains developing resistance over the last few decades –with fatal consequences: According to World Health Organization estimates, around 25,000 people die each year from AMR infections in Europe alone.
