Updates from the International Centre for Antimicrobial Resistance Solutions

C-CAMP, with support from ICARS, has launched the One Health AMR Challenge 2025 to identify, support and scale breakthrough technologies tackling AMR across human, animal, and environmental health. The initiative will support ready-to-deploy AMR solutions over the next two years in alignment with India’s National Action Plan 2.0 on AMR.

ICARS is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Shobha Shetty, Global Director for Agriculture and Food at the World Bank, to its Board of Directors. Dr. Shetty leads the World Bank's global work to help countries confront rising hunger and malnutrition, respond to the climate and biodiversity crises, and unlock better jobs through innovation and agribusiness investments.

In June 2025, representatives from ICARS travelled to Japan for a series of high-level engagements aimed at strengthening international collaboration on AMR. The visit included participation in the Nordic Health Days at the Word Expo 2025 in Osaka, a co-organised high-level event in Tokyo, delivering a lecture on AMR and One Health at the University of Tokyo, and bilateral meetings.

From 11–14 September 2025, ICARS co-hosted and participated in the ReAct Asia Pacific Regional Conference in Jakarta, Indonesia. Under the theme “From Declaration to Action: Operationalising One Health AMR Action in the Asia Pacific Region”, the conference convened diverse stakeholders to explore how global momentum on AMR can be translated into actionable, country-led solutions.

On the 22–23 of September, ICARS joined the official launch of the European Partnership on One Health Antimicrobial Resistance (EUP OHAMR), with an expected budget of €253 million and more than 50 partner organisations from across Europe and beyond involved, the Partnership will deliver coordinated, science-backed solutions to address AMR.

In September 2025, a national dissemination event in Lusaka, Zambia brought together government leaders, researchers, and local stakeholders to review the outcomes of a three-year AMS project, implemented in Zambia with support from ICARS.

In June 2025, ICARS team members travelled to Zambia and Zimbabwe to assess progress and provide technical support for ongoing projects aimed at sustainable antimicrobial use in livestock systems. These missions form part of ICARS’ commitment to working in close partnerships with country teams leading project implementation.

From 17 to 19 June 2025, Trinidad and Tobago’s capital Port of Spain became the hub of antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) and infection prevention and control (IPC) education, as healthcare professionals from across the Caribbean gathered for the first-ever drive-AMS Masterclass in the region.

In August 2025, nine researchers participated in a four-day bioinformatics workshop in Da Nang, Vietnam, led by Assistant Professor Yaovi Mahuton Gildas Hounmanou from the University of Copenhagen, to strengthen their capacity in analysing bacterial genomic data from aquaculture outbreaks for AMR surveillance.

This research project focuses on utilising probiotics in combination with red seaweed to improve rumen health, reduce methane emissions, decrease reliance on antibiotics, and enhance cattle productivity in Bangladeshi dairy farms. The combined probiotic–seaweed approach offers a synergistic solution that promotes animal health, food safety, climate-smart livestock production, and environmental sustainability.

The project seeks to test affordable, scalable strategies to reduce AMR and mitigate climate impacts in poultry farms in Nepal. The intervention combines disinfectant spraying and farmer training to improve biosecurity, lower emissions, promote responsible antibiotic use, and enhance climate resilience while reducing disease and AMR.

This summary brief captures key reflections from the high-level roundtable on AMR hosted by ICARS and ReAct Africa on 2 June 2025 at the Hamburg Sustainability Conference. The event brought together global stakeholders to discuss future actions to slow down the increasing burden of AMR globally.

This Comment from The Lancet Microbe introduces the Swiss cheese model of AMR, showing how successive imperfect layers of defence, when aligned effectively, can reduce risk and prevent system failure.