The IMC unites health industry professionals to combat antibiotic resistant infections

The Infection Management Coalition (IMC) has launched its White Paper, in a first-of-its-kind call to action, outlining the need for a change in the way infection is detected, monitored, prevented and managed across the NHS, other healthcare systems and wider society.

Having been assembled in January 2021, the IMC has sought to gain support in favour of holistic management and pandemic preparedness, following the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on societies and economies worldwide.

The IMC comprises of leading health professionals, the scientific community and industry, working together – with the involvement of the government – with the shared goal of implementing a more cohesive approach to infection management.

The IMC partners are Antibiotic Research UK, the Association of British HealthTech Industries (ABHI), the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI), BD, bioMérieux, the British In Vitro Diagnostics Association (BIVDA), the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (BSAC), Menarini UK, Pfizer UK, Roche Diagnostics UK, Thermo Fisher Scientific and the UK Sepsis Trust.

The Infection Management Coalition White Paper calls for the creation of a healthcare system which is resilient in the face of outbreak and pandemic preparedness, infection prevention, rapid treatment of time-critical viral and bacterial infection, with the aim of delivering effective antimicrobial stewardship (AMS). The White Paper builds on the findings published in The Lancet’s worldwide report on the burden of AMR, and underscores the ways society must collectively commit to delivering transformational change.

Dr Ron Daniels, founder and executive director of UK Sepsis Trust, said: “The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a light on the devastating global health and societal implications an infection can have when there are no available preventative interventions or treatment options.

“It concerns me greatly that the next pandemic may very well be a drug-resistant infection that the UK and its international partners are currently ill-equipped to tackle, despite the huge advances made recently in this space. We must act now to avoid this.”

The recommendations include how crucial support is for healthcare providers in prescribing antimicrobials effectively – from efficient use of care diagnostics to determine if antimicrobials are appropriate, to public health and vaccination programmes in helping to avoid reliance on antimicrobials.

The IMC has called for the development of cohesive policy to support action, which includes working as a united front in publishing holistic infection management plans that include AMR.

The coalition believes that many of the recommendations are attainable within the systems that already exist inside the NHS, government and wider society. It hopes that with a combination of organisational change required to drive these recommendations, the need for major government investment or a complete systems overhaul is significantly reduced.