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Wellcome has launched a new initiative to help improve surveillance of global drug-resistant infections.
The Surveillance and Epidemiology of Drug-resistant Infections Consortium (SEDRIC), which launched on 30 January 2018, aims to help countries track the spread of drug-resistant infections, and to improve processes of data sharing and analysis. Through this, they hope to reduce the global impact of antimicrobial resistance.
SEDRIC’s board is chaired by Sharon Peacock, a clinical microbiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the Wellcome Sanger Institute. The board also includes Iruka N Okeke, professor of pharmaceutical microbiology at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria.
Peacock said the new consortium would build on work by others, including the WHO’s Global Antimicrobial Surveillance System (GLASS) and the Fleming Fund. SEDRIC would, she said, work to identify critical gaps and barriers to surveillance efforts, and will help countries adopt sustainable best practices and strategies:
“We will provide technical expertise and knowledge, but will also look at how technology might be better employed to strengthen existing surveillance networks and activities,” she said.
