Category: News and press

JPIAMR welcome the Independent AMR Review Final report “Tackling Drug-Resistant Infections Globally: Final Report and Recommendations” that highlights the importance to tackle Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) on a global level.

–  As resistant bacteria know no national borders, we need to work at an international scale to tackle antimicrobial resistance, which is exactly what we do in the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance. We align national resources to fill knowledge gaps and today, we are 22 member states, enabling collaborative actions in this field, says Dr. Carlos Segovia, Chair of JPIAMR. The work performed by JPIAMR, The Joint Programming Initiative on AMR, is mentioned several times in the report. Our work is based on a Strategic Research Agenda covering the whole range of research fields related to AMR, and supports collaborative action to fill knowledge gaps. By mobilising existing and new resources, our initiative creates a greater critical mass and attracts new researchers into the AMR field.

–  We must carry out more research to better understand how resistance develops and spreads in the environment. Research should contribute to design effective programmes to change the use antibiotics, both in agriculture and in health care systems which are also key areas for improvement. We are therefore welcoming the suggestion from the reviewers to increase the incentives to reduce the antibiotic use in agriculture, but we need research to find new diagnostic tools, actions to prevent resistance transmission, and new antibiotics, says Dr. Carlos Segovia.

The 10 Joint Programming Initiatives (JPIS) has presented the last GPC meeting a Joint Statement of the 10 JPIs Chairs. The Statement follows the Lund Statement of the JPIs last December and aims to react to the recent Evaluation Report regarding the progress of the different JPIs.

The statement highlights:
• JPIs as one of the most important initiatives at European level addressing societal challenges. This requires also dialogue with the policy sectors concerned other than research itself, and is the justification for the next two points.
• In order to address societal challenges effectively, there is a need to bridge the gap between JPIs and national programming, and in this sense interpreting JPIs as a process of alignment taking a multilevel approach, meaning using a variety of instruments other than just funding. This assumes implicitly that funding decisions are only a final point in a process of decision making that should incorporate and increase consistency between JPIs and national programmes. Opening of national programmes to European dynamics to bridge the gap.
• JPIs should be taken as relevant actors in all European research initiatives, therefore should collaborate with ESFIC, GPC, ERAC, and participate in the discussions around the next framework programme.

You can find the full Statement here

Please note the specific Call Topic:

• Addressing the clinical burden of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI): evaluation of the burden, current practices and set up of a European research platform
• (part of the IMI New Drugs for Bad Bugs (ND4BB) programme)

Deadline for submitting short proposals under Call 9: Tuesday 26 July 2016. 

Find out more

The Call text, as well as details of how to apply, can be found on the respective web page.

Webinars

From 11 to 29 April 2016, IMI is holding information webinars on each of the Call topics as well as on IMI rules and procedures. The registration links, webinar presentations and video recordings can be found online. 

Find partners for submitting a proposal

Get advice on how to find project partners at www.imi.europa.eu/content/partner-search. 

Why apply?

The Calls for proposals represent an excellent opportunity for researchers to take part in ground-breaking collaborative projects that aim to deliver tangible benefits for patients. Scientists from academia, industry, SMEs, medium-sized companies, hospitals and patients’ organisations are warmly invited to get involved in our projects.

 

The symposium is organized jointly by the Medicinal Chemistry Section of the Swedish Pharmaceutical Society and ENABLE, one of the projects in the Innovative Medicines Initiative ND4BB, to showcase the future and opportunities for antibiotic drug discovery in a stimulating environment. It is also designed to provide plenty of opportunities to meet other delegates, renew friendships and foster new contacts. Please circulate this information widely in your networks.

Preliminary programme

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The JPIAMR, in partnership with 8 European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the UK), and Canada, is launching a fourth joint call for working group proposals.  The call sets out to assemble motivated groups of leading experts and establish Working Groups in order to enhance resource alignment and maximise existing and future efforts to combat AMR by pushing forward the conceptualisation of ideas, in turn providing white papers, prospective views, guidelines and/or best practice/ roadmap/systematic reviews and frameworks of value to the wider research community. Based on the priority topics identified in the JPIAMR Strategic Research Agenda, applicants are invited to tackle one or more of the suggested focal areas. However, the following examples are neither mandatory nor limiting. Working Groups should be assembled with emphasis on what is needed at a National and International level to address AMR.

DEADLINE:  The proposal submission deadline is June 6th, 2016 (17:00, CET).

More information and how to submit your application

IMI2 Prelaunch Flyer

The Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) will soon launch its 9^th Call for proposals under IMI 2.

The Call will include the topic:

• Addressing the clinical burden of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI): evaluation of the burden, current practices and set up of a European research platform (part of the IMI New Drugs for Bad Bugs (ND4BB) programme) 

Find out more

The Call indicative topics texts can be found on the respective web page: http://bit.ly/futuretopics.

Webinars

From 11 to 29 April 2016, IMI will hold information webinars on each of the Call topics as well as on IMI rules and procedures. Webinar registration is open via http://bit.ly/1RSPiTC.

 

The Conference will review what needs to be done to achieve a more prudent and appropriate use of antibiotics in the European Union (EU), with an emphasis on human use. It will bring together experts and policy makers on antimicrobial resistance.

Read more

The development of new antibiotics is a major aspect strongly associated to AMR. In a two days symposium international experts communicate state-of-the-art science from the definition of the problem.

Read more

 

 

The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation has launched a call for ‘Novel Approaches to Characterizing and Tracking the Global Burden of Antimicrobial Resistance’.

The goal is to identify approaches that provide more robust and reliable evidence regarding the global scale, impact, and/or transmission dynamics of AMR, specifically as applicable to low- and middle-income settings. The call also seeks solutions that will provide an assessment of various drivers and the health impact of interventions on rates of resistance.

Because AMR is a complex problem with multiple interconnected drivers and our focus is on high mortality and data-poor geographies, these approaches will likely require new data streams and approaches (e.g. modeling) applied in a sufficiently robust way to lead to strategic guidance for decision-makers.

The call is soliciting innovative ideas for models, tools, analytics, surveillance platforms, technologies, and other high impact approaches to generating evidence about the burden and impact of antimicrobial resistance in low and middle income settings, and improving its translation into practice. In particular, transformative and innovative approaches which identify and fill knowledge and practice gaps currently limiting progress in AMR surveillance and epidemiology are of interest.

Read more about the call.

The European Parliament could play a crucial role in shaping a European prudent use of antibiotics policy and JPIAMR can provide evidence and data to support such a policy. JPIAMR should also provide best practice guidelines. This was the main message from a meeting JPIAMR organised on 16 February 2016 with European Parliamentarians to discuss how the initiative can take an active part in the implementation of the EP resolution on ‘Safer healthcare in Europe: improving patient safety and fighting antimicrobial resistance’.

The aim of this informal meeting was to gather a smaller number of individuals to engage in concrete discussions on how the JPIAMR can really take on an active role in implementing the resolution on Safer Healthcare in Europe and other initiatives such as the European Action Plan. We need to make sure that all these good initiatives from research to policy making work together and move from words to implementation. Antimicrobial resistance is a real threat to society and there is not one solution to the problem. JPIAMR is already acting on a number of the issues addressed in the resolution but we would like to do more.

The meeting addressed the threat of antibiotic resistance, future legislation on prudent use of antibiotics and prescription behaviour of antibiotics, with several MEPs. Another topic on the agenda was how research can provide evidence for future political action in the field. For example, research can provide data and evidence on death rates or transmission of resitance through food. Also it is key to involve the agriculture sector.