London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Professor Chris Whitty, the new Chief Medical Officer for England, explores the topic of antimicrobial resistance.

This is the keynote lecture from the AMR Short Course which is designed to equip delegates with the knowledge, conceptual frameworks and tools necessary to understand and respond to the complex threat of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR). Whilst the short course incurs a fee, this lecture is free for all to attend.

Antimicrobial drug resistance for parasitic, mycobacterial and bacterial diseases in low-income settings is a difficult, but not impossible, policy problem. The debate tends to be dominated by discussions around improving drug pipelines, a necessary but far from complete solution. This lecture recognises that addressing resistance will require multiple incremental interventions rather than a single technological fix. It also recognises that relevant lessons that have been learned in one field are often largely unknown in other fields. It proposes that cross-learning, especially around behaviour change, between responses to resistance in different disease types is required. To achieve this, grouping the problems can help, and this lecture will set out five groups of problems that can enable cross-learning, as well as identifying ‘no-regrets’ interventions that can reduce the incidence of serious infection, overall antibiotic use and the burden of AMR.

Chris Whitty is Professor of Public and International Health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and a practising NHS Consultant Physician in acute medicine and infectious diseases at University College London Hospitals (UCLH). He has recently been appointed as the new Chief Medical Officer for England and the UK government’s Chief Medical Adviser.

Please note that this session will NOT be live-streamed/recorded.