Over the last month, Antibiotic Research UK has been appearing in the news, with both Professor Colin Garner, chief executive at ANTRUK, and Emily Morris, an ANTRUK ambassador, featuring in interviews and news articles.
Towards the end of May, Professor Garner was interviewed for the Pharmaceutical Journal, with regards to G20 health leaders meeting in Berlin and signing a declaration on global health that will feed into the G20 leaders’ summit, which is to be held later this year. At the meeting, the health ministers agreed that antimicrobial resistance is a threat to global health, and committed themselves to begin implementing national action plans to combat AMR by the end of 2018.
Tuesday 30th May was a particularly busy day. Fresh off the bank holiday, there was news that researchers in the United States had modified the antibiotic vancomycin and developed it to beat bacteria that was previously resistant to the antibiotic. Both Professor Garner and Emily were interviewed by a number of radio stations and news outlets throughout the day with regards to the news, including CNN, BBC Radio 4, and BBC World Service.
Whilst the new vancomycin research is promising, there is still plenty more work to be done as the drug has yet to be tested on human subjects, and it would only work for Gram-positive bacteria, so we still need answers for the more lethal Gram-negative superbugs out there.
If you would like to catch up with the latest stories that ANTRUK has been featured in, or if you’d like to listen back to the interviews with Professor Garner and Emily, you can find links to all the coverage below.
Please do share the stories with friends and family, and help us to improve awareness of this global threat, which will kill 10 million people per year by 2050 if we do not act now.
G20 health leaders’ agreement to tackle AMR
Pharmaceutical Journal – http://www.pharmaceutical-journal.com/news-and-analysis/news/g20-health-leaders-agree-to-tackle-antimicrobial-resistance/20202858.article
Vancomycin “super-antibiotic”
CNN – http://edition.cnn.com/2017/05/30/health/new-super-antibiotic/
Colin Garner interviews
BBC World Service (skip to 17:39) – http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p053q76w#play
BBC Radio Scotland (skip to 42:16) – http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08r318g
Emily Morris interview
BBC Radio 4 (skip to 22:24) – http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08rp30f