The socioeconomic drivers and impacts of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR): Implications for policy and research

The policy community acknowledges the significant health and economic impacts of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) on individuals, households, health systems, and society. However, they often neglect the socioeconomic and sociocultural drivers of AMR. Understanding these drivers can inform better interventions, as they include factors such as gender, living situations, education, healthcare access, governance, human mobility, conflict, climate change, agriculture, and pollution.

To ensure socioeconomic considerations are embedded in AMR policy, key elements should be built into the design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation. People-centeredness fosters equity-orientation, while multisectorality recognizes AMR as a cross-cutting issue. Effective governance and leadership are central to coordinating multisectoral action to address AMR’s wider determinants. Evidence-based policy involves interdisciplinary research and surveillance to understand and tackle the socioeconomic drivers of AMR.

Priorities for policy-makers include prevention, access, innovation, and stewardship policies. Prevention involves infection prevention and control in healthcare, biosecurity measures in agricultural settings, and equitable access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene infrastructure.