InnoVet-AMR is aimed at reducing the emerging risk that antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in animals poses to global health and food security.
This partnership between IDRC and the UK Department of Health and Social Care’s (DHSC) Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) is funding research to minimize the development of AMR in ruminants and aquaculture production — and the threat it poses to human health. InnoVet-AMR supports the prudent and reduced use of antimicrobials, and the development and uptake of innovative veterinary products in low- and middle-income countries.
Learn more about InnoVet-AMR research projects
The challenge
Antimicrobial resistance in animals remains a growing problem that threatens our ability to effectively treat bacterial infections in humans and animals. It endangers modern human and veterinary medicine and undermines the safety of our food and environment. Antibacterials particularly play a key role in healthy animal production systems and are critical to the treatment of diseases of farm animals, both terrestrial and aquatic.
Livestock and aquaculture keepers in low- and middle-income countries are highly affected by the increase of infectious disease outbreaks and loss in livestock productivity, which ultimately endangers food security and disrupts international trade. The contamination of animal products, and the wider environment, with antimicrobial-resistant bacteria is also a risk factor for humans, animals and the environment.
Evidence shows that, in more vulnerable countries, resistance to antimicrobials most often used in livestock agriculture, including those critical to human medicine, has significantly increased in the last 20 years. A recent study on the global burden of bacterial antimicrobial resistance in 2019 showed that sub-Saharan Africa had the highest AMR burden.
Given the severity and extent of the problem, failing to prevent the continued emergence of AMR will likely jeopardize progress towards achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. AMR was a priority of the health agenda at recent G7 and G20 meetings. The international community was called upon to rise to the complex challenge of AMR and take urgent action.
The initiative
InnoVet-AMR responds to a need identified by the international scientific and development communities. It is supported with high-level policy processes, including through the UN political declaration on AMR (2016), the G7 and G20, the Global Health Security Agenda and Action Plan, as well as the Global Action Plans of the World Health Assembly and the World Organization for Animal Health.
The initiative builds on DHSC’s expertise in championing innovation by supporting research and technology to improve lives. It also draws on IDRC’s history as a development research funder with decades of experience building knowledge-focused cross-sector partnerships.
Through InnoVet-AMR, IDRC and DHSC aim to achieve two key objectives in low- and middle-income countries:
- support research that will identify innovative veterinary solutions, including vaccines and alternative solutions, to reduce the use of antimicrobials in livestock and aquaculture operations
- build effective partnerships to better coordinate discovery, development and sustainable delivery of innovative veterinary solutions to reduce the use of antimicrobials in livestock and aquaculture operations
Polypeptides as an alternative to antibiotics
Nanoparticle-based vaccine against Escherichia coli
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Partners
