The Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership (GARDP) today welcomed the statements by the G7 Health Ministers and the G7 Finance Ministers, both of which called for greater investments and attention to addressing antimicrobial resistance (AMR), a silent pandemic of drug-resistant infections. The health ministers highlighted GARDP’s role to ‘support the development and approval of much-needed innovative antimicrobial therapeutics’. They also appreciated the development of a new antibiotic access initiative, known as SECURE, which was co-developed by GARDP and the World Health Organization (WHO), in collaboration with other international bodies.

The United Kingdom, which holds the Presidency of the G7 in 2021, has long been a global leader in both calling attention to AMR and putting forward concrete solutions and recommendations to galvanize international action. This has included the UK government’s role as a key partner and funder of GARDP, including its on-going support for the development of new and improved treatments for drug-resistant infections that pose the greatest threat to health as well as during the setting up of SECURE.

“GARDP applauds the leadership of the UK government and the G7 to invest and strengthen research and development for new health technologies to tackle antimicrobial resistance,” said Dr Manica Balasegaram, Executive Director of GARDP. “We welcome the recognition by the G7 – including the UK, Germany and Japan as three of our core stakeholders – of GARDP’s role in developing novel antibiotics for drug-resistant infections, and to ensure that such new products are affordable and accessible to all.”

“We also look forward to working with our partners, as well as governments, industry, and civil society, to introduce SECURE, whose mission is to accelerate and expand access to essential antibiotics in order to enable countries to address the silent pandemic of drug-resistant bacterial infections,” added Dr Balasegaram.

About GARDP

The Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership (GARDP) is a Swiss not-for-profit organization developing new treatments for drug-resistant infections that pose the greatest threat to health. GARDP was created by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Drugs for Neglected Diseasesinitiative (DNDi) in 2016 to ensure that everyone who needs antibiotics receives effective and affordable treatment. We aim to develop five new treatments by 2025 to fight drug-resistant infections. GARDP is funded by the governments of Germany, Japan, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, South Africa, Switzerland, United Kingdom, as well as Médecins Sans Frontières and private foundations.