Dear All, D-Day and the momentous Normandy landings were 81 years ago today. In a marvelous new article on bbc.com (and with thanks to Mike Hodges for pointing it out), we can read about how “Handwritten notes reveal Churchill’s penicillin concern ahead of D-Day.” The magic of penicillin was evident … but there wasn’t enough of
Dear All, Attention phage developers — the UK MHRA have compiled all their regulatory guidance for phage into one convenient location! The overview webpage gives these comments: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/regulatory-considerations-for-therapeutic-use-of-bacteriophages-in-the-uk “The MHRA has compiled a document containing all the relevant regulatory guidance pertinent to the development of phage therapeutic products. “Regulatory agencies and organisations have produced documentation
Dear All (Deeply wonkish alert! Settle in! Great stuff here!): For today, we have a deep dive into the ongoing work in the EU to develop a set of realistic pull incentives using our best understanding to date of realistic choices. If the idea of Pull (and Push) is new to you, please check out
Dear All (and with thanks to Kevin Outterson for co-authoring this newsletter), We’ve written before about the UK’s “Netflix” pilot antibiotic Pull incentive in which England leads the way on showing how it plans to provide its fair share of a global antibacterial Pull incentive (for background on Pull incentives, see this superb 5-minute video explainer). In
Dear All (and with thanks to Kevin Outterson for co-authoring this newsletter), Post-newsletter addendum: A slide deck that summarizes the data from the paper is now available. We talked in a 22 Mar 2021 newsletter about ensuring access to new antibiotics and you should take a moment to refresh your memory of its discussions of
Dear All (and with thanks to Damiano for taking the lead on this newsletter), We start the new year with good news from Rome! On Saturday 28 December 2024, the Italian Senate passed the government’s 2025 budget, giving parliament’s final approval to a financial package which includes a pull incentive for innovative antibiotics. As promised by Minister
Dear All, Sadly, I must report that the 27th meeting of PACCARB (the US Presidential Advisory Council on Combatting Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria) planned for 28-29 Jan 2025 has been cancelled “as the new Administration considers its plan for managing federal policy and public communications.” This 22 Jan 2025 article in the New York Times provides additional details
Dear All, If you are attending ESCMID Global in Vienna this year, mark your calendar for two major events. I hope to see you at both of them! First, there will be a Science Policy Forum afternoon (with networking reception) on Friday, 11 April 2025. Refined over the past two iterations of ECCMID, this event was
Dear All, The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is scheduled to meet 26-28 Feb 2025 (see links below my signature for deeper background on ACIP and how it advises on vaccine use). At least as of today, the ACIP meeting is scheduled to occur as planned: it has a full agenda that covers meningococcal vaccine, influenza
Dear All, If you represent a US-based organization with an interest in AMR, there is an opportunity to sign a letter advocating for AMR-related funding in the FY2026 US Government (USG) budget. Founded in 2014, IDSA’s S-FAR (Stakeholder Forum on Antimicrobial Resistance) has been steadily coordinating messages to the USG from professional groups with an interest