Wildlife, Agricultural soils, Water environments and antimicrobial resistance - what is known, needed and feasible for global Environmental Surveillance (WAWES)
The World Health Organization (WHO), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and World organisation for Animal health (OIE), agrees on that surveillance of antibiotic/antimicrobial resistant bacteria (AMR) should be performed using a one-health multi-sectorial approach. Despite this there is today an overall lack of surveillance focusing on the environment and wildlife. Furthermore, there is unquestionably a lack of standardization and uniformization of studies and efforts performed regarding AMR on the environment and wildlife. The JPIAMR Strategic research agenda published in 2013 also highlighted the lack of data, comparable information and cross-sectorial studies in the environment. To amend this, we have initiated the network WAWES - Wildlife, Agricultural soils, Water environments and antibiotic resistance what is known, needed and feasible? - A proposal for a global Environmental Surveillance, which consists of 27 partners from 17 countries from all over the globe representing low to high income settings. WAWES has the shared objective to find a way to perform a global comparative surveillance of AMR in the environment and wildlife, which could be applicable in the majority of countries despite economic resources. Due to the complexity of the environment WAWES will however as an initial phase chiefly focus on the sectors of wildlife, agricultural soils, wastewaters and impacted water environments.