World Antimicrobial Resistance Awareness Week 2025

The misuse and overuse of antimicrobials in humans, animals, and plants are the primary drivers of drug-resistant infections.

Examples include:

• Human misuse: inappropriate prescribing, incomplete treatment courses, and over-the-counter access in some regions.

• Agriculture and farming: routine use of antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention in healthy livestock, creating strong selective pressure for resistance.

• Plant production: antimicrobial pesticides used to prevent crop diseases can also select for resistant microbes.

These practices accelerate the emergence and spread of drug-resistant pathogens, undermining our ability to treat infections effectively.

AMR affects all countries regardless of income level and spreads easily across borders. Its emergence and persistence are driven by several interconnected factors, including limited access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) for both humans and animals, as well as poor infection prevention and control practices in homes, healthcare facilities, and farms. Many communities also face restricted access to vaccines, diagnostics, and high-quality medicines, while widespread lack of awareness and weak enforcement of antimicrobial regulations further accelerate the problem. As a result, populations living in low-resource settings are disproportionately impacted, experiencing both higher exposure to the drivers of AMR and more severe consequences, such as untreated infections, prolonged illness, and increased healthcare costs.

AMR is a complex, multisectoral challenge requiring coordinated action across human health, veterinary medicine, agriculture, and the environment.

One Health is an integrated approach recognizing that the health of humans, domestic and wild animals, plants, and ecosystems are interconnected. There is an urgent need for joint planning, surveillance, and policy-making to strengthen the One Health framework. This is essential to strengthen AMR prevention and control and supports more sustainable outcomes across sectors.

• Hookworm infection. Department Chair Dr. Michael Cappello’s group is sequencing hookworm populations across Ghana to uncover genetic differences that may explain why albendazole mass drug administration is becoming less effective in some communities. Their work will reveal whether emerging drug resistance is driving poor treatment response and inform stronger deworming strategies.

• Malaria. Dr. Amy Bei and Dr. Sunil Parikh lead groups conducting active surveillance for antimalarial resistance in East and West Africa. Their research programs help track emerging resistance patterns and inform the deployment of effective malaria treatments.

• Tuberculosis. Dr. Ted Cohen studies how drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis and comorbidities impede TB control efforts. His team develops innovative modeling approaches integrating pharmacokinetics and bacterial killing data, aiding in the design of improved anti-TB regimens to reduce morbidity and transmission.

• Invasive pneumococcal disease. Dr. Stephanie Perniciaro’s work focuses on optimizing vaccine impact for respiratory diseases such as invasive pneumococcal disease as a strategy for addressing antimicrobial resistance through prevention.

• Drug-resistant bacterial infections. Dr. Paul Turner’s work on bacteriophages is informing exciting new therapies to treat and enhance the antimicrobial susceptibility of severe drug-resistant pathogens, such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus.