Community engagement: The key to tackling Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) across a One Health context?
Date
2021
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Taylor & Francis Group
Abstract
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a One Health problem underpinned by
complex drivers and behaviours. This is particularly so in low – and
middle-income countries (LMICs), where social and systemic factors fuel
(mis)use and drive AMR. Behavioural change around antimicrobial use
could safeguard both existing and future treatments. However,
changing behaviour necessitates engaging with people to understand
their experiences. This publication describes a knowledge-exchange
cluster of six LMIC-based projects who co-designed and answered a
series of research questions around the usage of Community
Engagement (CE) within AMR. Findings suggest that CE can facilitate
AMR behaviour change, specifically in LMICs, because it is a
contextualised approach which supports communities to develop
locally meaningful solutions. However, current CE interventions focus
on human aspects, and demand-side drivers, of AMR. Our cluster
suggests that broader attention should be paid to AMR as a One Health
issue. The popularity of mixed methods approaches within existing CE
for AMR interventions suggests there is interdisciplinary interest in the
uptake of CE. Unfortunately, the specificity and context-dependency of
CE can make it difficult to evaluate and scale. Nevertheless, we suggest
that in synthesising learnings from CE, we can develop a collective
understanding of its scope to tackle AMR across contexts.
Description
Research Article
Keywords
Antimicrobial resistance, community engagement, One Health, context, knowledge exchange