Antibiotics In Societies. Online Panel Series 2020-2021

“Learning from Fresh Perspectives: from insights to action on antibiotic use”

Social Research Findings and Implications Panels:

Antibiotics as Care: health facility based (23^rd September 10.30-12:00pm BST). To watch the this session, please click here.

Panellists:

• Alex Broom, The University of Sydney
• Paula Saukko, Loughborough University
• Justin Dixon, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
• Esmita Charani, Imperial College London

Antibiotics beyond health facilities: care, pharmaceuticals and markets (22^nd October 10.30 am-12:00pm GMT). To watch this session, please click here.

Panellists:

• Papreen Nahar, University of Sussex
• Marco Haenssgen, University of Warwick
• Susan Nayiga, Infectious Diseases Research Collaboration, Kampala
• Mark Davis, Monash University

Chair:

• Helen Lambert, Bristol Medical School

Antibiotics beyond humans: ecologies, production, flows (18th November 2:30 pm- 4:00 pm GMT). To watch this session, please click here.

Panellists:

• Stephen Hinchliffe, University of Exeter
• Claas Kirchhelle, University College Dublin
• Salla Sariola, University of Helsinki
• Rijul Kochhar, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Antibiotic science, technology and infrastructures (17^th December 10.30-12:00pm GMT). To watch this session, please click here.

Panellists:

• Charlotte Brives, University of Bordeaux
• Komatra Chuengsatiansup, Princess Maha Chakri Siridhorn Anthropology Centre
• Catherine Will, University of Sussex
• Nik Brown, University of York

Addressing Antibiotic Use Event: Addressing Antibiotic Use (24^th February 2021, 12:00-2:00 pm GMT). To register for this event, please click here.

Background

The past five years has seen social research on the topic of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) flourish. The field has expanded in multiple directions, with innovative and informative research that has followed medicines, microbes, patients, animals, care providers, policies, and much more. One key area of expansion, in which a variety of fresh perspectives from social theory have been applied across multiple settings around the globe, is the reasons for antibiotic use. There are now many excellent research studies that have explored and explained different aspects of antibiotic use, drawing on a variety of disciplines including anthropology, sociology, geography, history, philosophy, law, economics, political science, psychology and design. Each of these studies presents insights into the reasons that societies – and constituent groupings – have come to be entangled with antibiotic medicines. And each stimulates ideas for response, in policy, programme or pilot form. The momentum for action on AMR at a global and national level has generated strong interest in the drivers of antibiotic use, and moreover ‘what to do’. This seems a critical moment to join together the insights from across the multiple social research projects that have generated new evidence and ideas in recent years, in order to provide a steer from social researchers towards a policy, funder and other-discipline audience.

Objective

These panels will bring together key insights from recent social research studies into the questions of (a) why antibiotics are being used in the ways that they are, in different settings and (b) what social researchers propose should be done to address this.

Approach

Four Thematic Panels through Q3&4 2020, brought together into a report with infographics, will be followed by a half-day event on ‘Addressing Antibiotic Use’ in Q1 (feb) 2021.

Thematic panels

The four Thematic Panels will bring together social researchers to present and discuss their key findings and implications for policy/programmes/pilots. Each of the four panels will group together different lead individuals from recent research projects under four themes. Themes were developed from those set out on the AMIS website, and which were used as an organising structure for the 2018 Social Science and AMR symposium at the British Academy. An advisory group* has guided the themes and composition of the proposed panels and will support the review of the final report, together with others who contribute to the panels and process.

Report

The Antibiotics In Societies report will compile commonalities and differences from across the thematic panels on the topics of (a) describing antibiotic use; (b) reasons for antibiotic use; and (c) ways to address antibiotic use in policy, programmes and pilots. The report’s contents will form the basis of the discussion at the half-day event in February.

Addressing Antibiotic Use – Roundtable

How can insights from social science better inform efforts to address antibiotic use in humans, animals and crops around the world? 

This online Roundtable will launch a report of recommendations from social research about how best to address the increasing – and yet uneven – use of antibiotics across the One Health spectrum. Responding to calls for increased attention to social and behavioural aspects of antibiotic use, the evidence base on this topic is now expanding – reflected in a series of four panels in 2020. Bringing together the implications of these findings for policy, programmes and pilots in a timely way is critical if we are to enable practice to be informed by this research. The Addressing Antibiotic Use roundtable brings into conversation the findings from social researchers with the perspectives of those engaged in policy, programmes and research on AMR.

The roundtable will comprise:

• Launch of the report – Addressing Antibiotic Use: Recommendations from Social Research around the World
• Roundtable Part 1 – Consideration of the recommendations from policy and programme perspectives
• Roundtable Part 2 – Consideration of the recommendations from research and research funder perspectives

We are excited to announce our roundtable participants, who represent a range of institutions, expertise and focus points:

• Professor Iruka Okeke, University of Ibadan, MRC/DfID
• Dr Tim Jinks, Wellcome Trust
• Dr Watipaso Kasambara, Public Health Institute of Malawi (PHIM)
• Dr Hung Nguyen, International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) Vietnam
• Dr Haileyesus Getahun, World Health Organization
• Professor Sujith Chandy, Christian Medical College Vellore
• Professor Sabiha Essack, University of KwaZulu-Natal
• Dr Franck Berthe, the World Bank, and Livestock Global Alliance

The event will be chaired by Professor Clare Chandler, LSHTM.

To register please click here.