Following a multi-million pound investment by the UK government, new medications will be developed to combat drug-resistant illnesses, which are the biggest danger to world health.
One in five of these deaths occurs in children under the age of five due to antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which occurs when serious illnesses have advanced to the point that antibiotics and other conventional therapies are no longer effective.
The World Health Organization has identified drug-resistant infections as the biggest threat to global health and development, and the government’s Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) has invested £4.5 million to support the Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership (GARDP) in developing new treatments for these infections.
The UK has already contributed £19 million to the GARDP’s programs, which include finding new and better ways to treat pneumonia, hospital-acquired bacterial infections, and neonatal sepsis, the top cause of infant mortality.
According to recent research, more individuals died of resistant bacterial diseases in 2019 than from HIV or malaria.
Sajid Javid, the secretary of state for health and social care, said:
The biggest threat to world health is antimicrobial resistance, which cruelly claims millions of lives annually yet is little understood.
If this silent epidemic is not addressed today, the results could be disastrous and prevent us from being able to treat common ailments like pneumonia and infections in babies with current medications in the future.
The UK’s commitment will provide critical medications that help safeguard millions of people worldwide, especially in low- and middle-income nations, strengthening our global health security.
The cash will also be used to create a cutting-edge treatment for gonorrhoea, a sexually transmitted infection for which the World Health Organization has declared a critical need for fresh antibiotics.
The UK Government’s 20-year vision and five-year National Action Plan for Antimicrobial Resistance include today’s commitment, which solidifies the UK’s leadership position in the global fight against AMR.
Executive Director of GARDP Manica Balasegaram said:
The UK has demonstrated outstanding leadership in advancing the research and availability of medicines for infections that are drug-resistant.
We have developed a strong late-stage clinical pipeline of novel and improved medicines for gonorrhoea, infants with sepsis, and dangerous bacterial infections in hospitalized adults thanks to GAMRIF’s funding throughout the years.
We anticipate their ongoing assistance as we step up our efforts to protect the efficacy of antibiotics.
AMR was kept as a multilateral priority in 2021 by the UK’s G7 Presidency, and it was acknowledged as a significant health issue by the G7 health and finance ministers.
The UK’s Special Envoy on AMR, Prof. Dame Sally Davies, stated:
It is essential to work together with international partners to address global issues, as evidenced by the G7 Health Ministers’ reaffirmation of their support for GARDP this year.
I’m overjoyed that the UK will collaborate with GARDP to deliver important research as part of GAMRIF’s dedication to a One Health strategy.
Together, we are leading efforts to address AMR in areas with the highest infection burden, and we will use this funding to create innovative anti-drug-resistant infection therapies to save the most vulnerable people in the world.
The UK and GARDP have a cooperation because they agree that creating novel medicines and making sure everyone who needs them has access to them go hand in hand.
This initiative is supported by UK aid and research to lessen the threat of antibiotic resistance.