Aside: Please look closely at the forward calendar. In addition to two new webinars from GARDP’s REVIVE project, there is a meeting in Thailand in December that focuses on alternatives to antibiotics. I’m told that the program is primarily focused on veterinary and agricultural uses, but previous year’s attendees have found the discussion to have broad application in other domains.
Dear All:
On 28-29 June 2019, the G20 met in Osaka. You may recall that AMR was considered by the G20 in 2017 (first by the Health Ministers and then by the full meeting) and again in 2018 (see item #15 in the 2018 Leaders’ Declaration). Competition to get (and keep) things on the agenda is always fierce, so it was great to see AMR again included on the 2019 agenda.
Specifically, AMR is referred to in the 2019 Leaders’ Declaration as Item #33. Here’s the text of that item — please note (emphasis mine) the final sentence:
- 33. We will accelerate efforts based on the One-Health approach to tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Recognizing the UN Secretary-General’s report on AMR, which was informed by the recommendations of the UN Interagency Coordination Group on AMR and other relevant initiatives, we encourage all stakeholders including international organizations to act and coordinate on those items relevant to their missions that contribute to global efforts to combat AMR. We recognize the need for policy measures for infection prevention and reduction of excessive antimicrobial usage. Further action should be taken to promote stewardship of and access to antimicrobials. Noting the ongoing work done by Global AMR R&D Hub, we will promote R&D to tackle AMR. We call on interested G20 members and Global AMR R&D Hub to analyze push and pull mechanisms to identify best models for AMR R&D and to report back to relevant G20 Ministers.
I also know that AMR was specifically discussed at a joint meeting of the G20 Health and Finance ministers (as one article on this, see this link for a note about the attendance of the UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer) as well as at the 24 June 2019 Health 20 Summit held in Tokyo where one of the meeting’s themes was Push and Pull Incentives for AMR. The Call to Action from the H20 Summit is here and I’ll call your attention to this item: “Urge that new antibiotic reimbursement models should be implemented based on value and not volume.”
All of this is wonderful to see! These conversations really matter … I think that involving education financial and economic leaders in discussions of AMR is the key to getting effective Push and Pull support for work on AMR.
All best wishes, –jr
John H. Rex, MD | Chief Medical Officer, F2G Ltd. | Expert-in-Residence, Wellcome Trust. Follow me on Twitter: @JohnRex_NewAbx. See past newsletters and subscribe for the future: https://13.43.35.2/blog/
Upcoming meetings of interest to the AMR community:
- 9 Jul 2019 (webinar, 17:00-18:30 CEST): REVIVE webinar entitled “Infection models for antimicrobial R&D: Intracellular models”. Go here to register.
- 10-11 Jul 2019 (Madison, WI): Tiny Earth Symposium, a teaching consortium that uses crowd-sourcing of antibiotic-producing microbes to improve undergraduate education. Details here.
- 11-12 Jul 2019 (Washington, DC): FDA-sponsored workshop entitled “Leveraging Randomized Clinical Trials to Generate Real-World Evidence for Regulatory Purposes.” Go here for more details.
- 12 Jul 2019 (FDA, White Oak Campus): Public workshop to discuss the 2018 LPAD guidance. Register here.
- 15-19 Jul 2019 (Dallas, TX): Small World Initiative Instructor Training Workshop — training for undergraduate professors and high school teachers in wet lab techniques, parallel curricula, pedagogical instruction to engage students in the hunt for new antibiotics in soil. Go here to register.
- [NEW] 18 Jul 2019 (webinar, 9:00-10:30 CEST): REVIVE webinar entitled “IEnabling academia to fill the discovery gap – Learnings from industry and funders.” Go here to register.
- [NEW] 20 Aug 2019 (webinar, 17:00-18:30 CEST): REVIVE webinar entitled “Models for antimicrobial R&D: Computational modelling for population PK and PKPD.” Go here to register.
- [Mark your calendar now!] 3-6 Sep 2019 (Boston). Annual ASM-ESCMID Conference on Antibiotic Development. The Bootcamp series will continue on 3 Sep with main meeting on 4-6 Sep. Mark your calendar now and check back here for details.
- [NEW] 6 Sep 2019 (Cambridge): CeBIL Annual Symposium 2019: Legal Innovation to Support the Development of Anti-Microbial Drugs. For more details and to register, go here.
- 6-8 Sep 2019 (Bilbao, Spain): 5th ESCMID conference on Vaccines. Check back here for details.
- 2-6 Oct 2019 (Washington, DC): IDSA’s annual IDWeek meeting.
- 19-27 Oct 2019 (Annecy, France): International Course on Antibiotics and Resistance (ICARe) – A soup-to-nuts intensive residential training program on all things AMR, especially R&D for new antibiotics. See this link for details.
- [NEW] 16-18 Dec 2019 (Bangkok, Thailand): 3rd International Symposium on Alternatives to Antibiotics in Animal Production. Go here for details: https://www.ars.usda.gov/alternativestoantibiotics/
- 1-6 Mar 2020 (Il Ciocco, Tuscany, Italy): GRC on Antibacterial Discovery and Development: “Now is the time to re-boot antibiotic R&D before it’s too little, too late.” Go here for details.
- 12-13 Mar 2020 (Berlin?): BEAM-, Novo REPAIR-, CARB-X-, DZIF-, ND4BB-, ENABLE-supported (among a long list!) Conference on Novel Antimicrobials and AMR Diagnostics. Final location is TBD, details will appear here, and you should mark your calendar now.
- 16-17 Mar 2020 (London): BSAC Spring Conference entitled: “Bridging the gap between science, policy and effective antimicrobial use.” Go here for details.
- 18-21 Apr 2020 (Paris): Annual ECCMID meeting (#30)
- 25-30 May 2020 (Rotterdam), Annual ESPID meeting (European Society for Pediatric ID, #38)
- 10-13 Apr 2021 (Vienna): Annual ECCMID meeting (#31)