Tagline: Reducing the contribution of the livestock sector to antimicrobial resistance against medically important antibiotics?
Champion: Tim Robinson
Team: Tim (+LSE), Delia (+ FSZ), ULB, FAO, ETH-Zurich …. and others
One of the major public health challenges faced by humanity this century is the development of antimicrobial resistance in many important pathogens. Beyond the abuse antibiotics in medicine, the burgeoning use of antimicrobials in livestock production is exacerbating this problem. Demand growth in developing economies (especially the BRICS countries) is driving a poorly regulated growth in livestock production that is expected to more or less double antimicrobial use in the livestock sector by 2030.
In developing countries, there is a dual problem of lack of access to antimicrobials among smallholders and over-use in the intensive sector. Policies aimed to reduce use may have negative impacts on food security. Moreover, the agriculture practices in developing countries are likely to have a higher dependency on antibiotics because of a more disease-prone environment and lower levels of biosecurity.
With growing transportation networks and international trade pathogens travel quickly around the world making this a global problem, calling for global solutions. It is also a multi-sectoral issue – involving, for example, consumers of animal source foods, the retail industry, livestock farmers, the livestock feed industry, animal health practitioners, regulatory bodies, the pharmaceutical industry and the medical sector.
Providing reliable evidence to guide multi-stakeholder platforms will be essential to bring about the practice changes needed to reduce the contribution of the livestock sector to the growing risk to society of antimicrobial resistance.
The idea here is to lead a major effort to improve our estimates of antimicrobial use in livestock production and to develop analytical frameworks that link antimicrobial use in the livestock sector to the development of antimicrobial resistance. This will build on ILRI’s work on livestock density and production systems mapping, predicting system changes in response to growing demand, and our understanding of antimicrobial use in livestock production.
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