Dr. Lesley Ogilvie
Secretariat Director, Global AMR R&D Hub
Dr. Ralf Sudbrak
Secretariat Deputy Director, Global AMR R&D Hub
The global fight against antimicrobial resistance is being taken to a new level by a ‘neutral broker’ organisation that is providing evidence to help set priorities and maximise the impact of resources and efforts invested into AMR research.
The Global AMR Research and Development (R&D) Hub was launched following a call from G20 Leaders to improve coordination and collaboration in AMR R&D. Aiming to provide an evidence base in support of improving R&D across the One Health spectrum, it is working to support and strengthen the pipelines of new antibiotics and other necessary products to combat AMR.
Push and pull incentive challenges
The Hub, launched in May 2018, is a partnership of Member States and the European Union alongside philanthropic foundations. Hub Secretariat Director, Dr Lesley Ogilvie, says it aims to galvanise support and collaboration across countries, but challenges remain across the antibiotic ‘push and pull spectrum’ with limited return on investment for companies when new antibiotics are kept in reserve.
‘Push’ incentives aim to support innovation, research and development of new antibiotics, regardless of successful access to the market. ‘Pull’ incentives aim to reward new antibiotics that have proven clinically relevant to patients while ensuring stewardship, access and developers’ financial viability. “The consensus is growing that the most critical products are not getting to the people that need them most — it’s a market failure but most importantly a public health failure,” adds Ogilvie.
A major push is geared towards the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) 2024 on AMR.
Dynamic dashboard capabilities
The Hub’s online Dynamic Dashboard platform offers an overview of the global AMR funding landscape across the One Health spectrum — human, animal, plant and environment — and presents information on investments, antibacterial products in the clinical pipeline and push and pull incentives.
Hub Secretariat Deputy Director Ralf Sudbrak, says the dashboard makes global data available to decision-makers, politicians, funders and researchers to identify opportunities and funding gaps.
Other Hub outputs include an overview of the progress countries are making on specific initiatives, funding factsheets and reports on data and implementation of research in low and middle-income countries (LMICs).
Setting concrete AMR R&D targets
A major push is geared towards the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) 2024 on AMR. “We are trying to get concrete actions and accountability embedded into a UNGA declaration,” says Ogilvie. “We need to come together as a global community to ensure we develop solutions with the most impact.”
They aim to keep AMR R&D high on political agendas with a push for actionable commitments and a process for setting R&D targets from UNGA. Sudbrak says the Hub is viewed as a ‘neutral broker’ but warned that the world is running out of tools because of AMR.