The first live webinar in the JPIAMR webinar series on AMR in a post-pandemic world, Have antibiotics been appropriately used in the COVID-19 pandemic?, was held on the 25th of June.
The webinar panel was moderated by Jesús Rodriguez Baño (ES), with panellists Gian Maria Rossolini (IT), Constance Schultsz (NL), Evelina Tacconelli (IT), Srinivas Murthy (CA), Norio Ohmagari (JP) and Alison Holmes (UK).
A conclusion made from the dicussion is that the COVID-19 pandemic has shown the Achilles heel of the fight against antimicrobial resistance since as soon as there is clinical uncertainty antimicrobial usage increases. Other key takeaways from the webinar are:
- Antibiotics were excessively used early in the COVID-19 pandemic
- Redundancy for diagnostics need to be implemented to maintain the capacity to diagnose bacterial and fungal pathogens, even under emergency situations
- Antimicrobial stewardship procedures must remain in place in the COVID-19 pandemic, or any future pandemic
- Collection and analysis of global data on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on AMR is needed, including data from low and middle income-countries (LMIC)
- Clinical and scientific teamwork has been strong during the COVID-19 pandemic
A video recording of the full webinar is now available:
Webinar video: Have antibiotics been appropriately used in the COVID-19 pandemic?
Other seminars in this series:
- AMR Research: Facilitating AMR research in the COVID-19 pandemic
- How do we simultaneously manage the acute COVID-19 pandemic and escalating antibiotic resistance?
More information on the webinar series: AMR research in a post pandemic world
