The Society for General Microbiology tackles antimicrobial resistance
18 November 2014
Today, 18 November, is European Antibiotic Awareness Day, and it presents a timely opportunity to highlight the action the Society for General Microbiology is taking to address antimicrobial resistance (AMR), an issue of global importance.
Small World Initiative will enable university and school students and the general public to join the hunt for new antibiotics
Today, the Society launched ‘The Small World Initiative’ in the UK and Ireland, a project that will give the general public, students and educators the opportunity to work with scientists as part of a global initiative to discover new antibiotics. Further details can be found on our website.
Learned societies taking action to tackle antimicrobial resistance
Today, the Society and six other learned societies, who together represent around 75,000 scientists, have announced a partnership to take action against the global challenge of AMR.
In the announcement, the Learned Society Partnership on Antimicrobial Resistance (LeSPAR) sets out its goal to proactively support its collective research community to generate, share and apply AMR research.
To achieve this goal, LeSPAR is working to facilitate opportunities for networking and knowledge exchange between academia, industry, clinicians and policy-makers.
LeSPAR is also engaging with government and other funders to ensure the correct policy and funding is in place to support and sustain the AMR research community.
The Society welcomes the opportunity to work alongside other learned societies to address this crucial issue.
Society for General Microbiology President speaks to civil servants about AMR
Last Monday, the Society’s President Professor Nigel Brown addressed over 30 civil servants from across government, including representatives from the Department of Health, Department of Business Innovation and Skills, and Department for International Development, about the science and policy issues behind AMR and Ebola.
During the presentation, which was co-organised by the Society and the Government Office of Science, Professor Brown highlighted the LeSPAR partnership, before going on to speak about the scientific and policy issues that make AMR difficult to tackle, such as scientific and economic barriers to drug development and the need for better education and data on antibiotic use for both health professionals and the public.
The talk concluded with a brief discussion of the science policy issues surrounding the other hot microbiology topic in the news, Ebola.
The presentation was very well received, with many questions on both AMR and Ebola and positive comments received from attendees after the event.
Image: iStock/Thinkstock.
