This week is Global Antimicrobial Resistance Awareness Week, an annual initiative of the World Health Organization (WHO). The goal is to increase understanding and awareness of the risks of antibiotic resistance. This is also an important research topic at Wageningen University and Research. An initiative in which three PhD students will be appointed to the research institutes Wageningen Food Safety Research (WFSR), Wageningen Bioveterinary Research (WBVR) and RIVM (Dutch National Institute of Public Health and the Environment) will further intensify this collaboration. The goal of this collaboration is to better understand the spread of antibiotic resistance in and among farm animals, food and humans.
Antibiotic resistance has a major impact on the ability to treat bacterial infectious diseases and thus on human and animal health. Plasmids play an important role in making bacteria resistant. They contain genetic information, including resistance genes, and are easily exchangeable between (different types of) bacteria.
In order to better understand the spread of resistance plasmids between animals, food and humans, a PhD student will be appointed to each of the institutes to investigate this topic from a specific angle.
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WFSR, WBVR and RIVM have been working together for years in the context of national monitoring of antibiotic resistance in farm animals, food and humans. The goal of this new initiative is to increase knowledge about the distribution of these resistance plasmids from a One Health perspective. It is an interdisciplinary collaboration to improve the health of people, animals and the environment. In this way, distribution routes and unknown risks are mapped. These new knowledge and insights may contribute to the reduction of resistant bacterial infections in humans and animals.
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