Science alone will not solve the crisis antimicrobial resistance represents
There are multiple factors that contribute to antimicrobial resistance. These are often grounded in individual and collective behaviours that cause the inappropriate use of antibiotics and other antimicrobials. For instance, individuals might not complete the full course of antibiotics as prescribed, providing an opportunity for resistant bacteria to develop.
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While science is a key part of the fight against antimicrobial resistance, scientific research can’t be successfully translated into real-world solutions without the efforts of policymakers, healthcare professionals, and the public.
Greater than the sum of its parts
The Fleming Initiative will break down barriers between scientists, policymakers, and the public through the founding of The Fleming Centre, a co-location space in London.
The Fleming Centre’s activities and impact
will be delivered through four workstreams.
Each workstream has its own professional specialism, but their work will be collaborative and interdependent, leading to the emergence of powerful new ideas and an opportunity
for a faster route to real world impact.
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The co-location model will allow for research
to be led by priorities across all relevant disciplines, ensuring the Centre’s results will be shared widely throughout academic and policy channels, and better embedding our interventions in industry and the community.
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The Fleming Centre is structured
to maximise real-world impact.
The Fleming Centre Behavioural Science Workstream will identify priorities for behaviour change, explore the determinants of these behaviours, and work with the public to co-create novel, behaviourally informed interventions that inspire collective behaviour change.
There are three key goals within the Behavioural Science Workstream:
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1. Co-creation of behavioural science research with the public
Ensuring this research is co-created with the public is at the heart of the Fleming Centre Behavioural Science Workstream mission. This approach will ensure that our research has maximal impact, as it will be designed with and for the target audiences.
We have formed collaborations with The Behavioural Insights Team and YouTube Health to deliver a series of research projects that aim to co-design behavioural science informed interventions.
Uniquely, the workstream is co-located alongside a public exhibition space where we will host behavioural science experiments – engaging the public as participants to develop and trial our interventions through interactive exhibitions and installations.
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2. Applying academic rigour to produce meaningful impact
Our behavioural science research will be conducted with the utmost academic rigour at every stage, ensuring our results are robust, can be replicated and reliably inform policy. Our interventions will be tested pragmatically in online and real-world settings, with a view to obtaining clear answers about which interventions can create meaningful behaviour change and are suitable for scale.
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3. Enabling global scaling of behavioural research and interventions
Antimicrobial resistance is a global challenge, and collective behaviour change must happen at scale. The Behavioural Science Workstream will work with global research partners, using the work at The Fleming Centre in London as an initial test bed for research and interventions.
We know the determinants of behaviour relating to antimicrobial resistance are likely to be different in different global settings. We will work with established global research partners to tailor and adapt our outputs, informed by local qualitative research, to ensure our research is relevant and has impact at scale.
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Behavioural Science
If we change our behaviours, we can keep antibiotics working for another hundred years
Translational Science
Harnessing the newest innovations to better interpret
and utilise complex data, and develop novel treatments
and interventions
The Fleming Centre Science Workstream recognises that scientific disciplines too often work in silos, without fully meeting the potential of strategically directed and co-operative research.
The Translational Science Workstream will be guided by the needs of the public and driven by a culture of convergence science – in which historically siloed disciplines work together in a deeply collaborative manner – with the aim of most effectively translating research into real-world impact.
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There are three key goals within the Science Workstream:
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1. Harnessing the newest innovations in artificial intelligence to better interpret and utilise complex biological data.
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2. Promote the development of novel treatments for drug-resistant infections
and novel diagnostics to ensure appropriate use of antimicrobial drugs.
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3. Develop our understanding of how drug-resistant infections are transmitted,
and how novel surveillance approaches might allow us to better detect and track
drug-resistant infections.
Policy
Developing and implementing novel policy measures
to decrease antimicrobial resistance
The Fleming Centre Policy Workstream will bring together policymakers from different organisations – and connect them with the public – uniting them with the common mission of using policy tools to tackle antimicrobial resistance, domestically and internationally.
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It recognises that in today’s highly interconnected world, nations cannot effectively combat antimicrobial resistance in isolation: the Policy Workstream will strengthen
the UK’s position as a leader in antimicrobial resistance policy, and work to share
its learnings, particularly with lower-to-middle income countries with fewer
policy-making resources.
There are three key goals within the Policy Workstream:
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1. Developing a Model National Action Plan for Tackling Antimicrobial Resistance: An exemplar plan that can be tailored according to country context and available resourcing.
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2. Sharing case studies of engaging with the public and professionals in policy making that could be replicated in other contexts.
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3. Innovating financial policies to incentivise the development of new antibiotics, diagnostics, and other technologies to reduce antimicrobial resistance.
Public Engagement & Involvement
People-powered research
Slowing the spread of antimicrobial resistance requires a step change in global awareness
of its causes and solutions, as a pre-requisite to collective behaviour change.
The Fleming Centre Public Engagement and Involvement Workstream will drive global citizen engagement on the issue and put the public at the heart of solving this crisis.
We will ensure the solutions we develop are relevant, valued, trusted and widely adopted,
by enabling the public to take part in their development and implementation.
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There are three key goals within the Public Engagement and Involvement Workstream:
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1. Build a culture where the public voice is valued by those tackling the antimicrobial crisis, so that society’s role is at the centre of solutions. The Workstream will support all Fleming Centre staff and collaborators – from researchers to policymakers –
in engaging and involving the public in their work.
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2. Directly engage and involve the public locally in tackling antimicrobial resistance through events, exhibitions, and online content, to build a shared sense of motivation and urgency.
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3. Directly engage and involve the public globally in tackling antimicrobial resistance, by sharing and adapting Fleming Centre’s powerful content via our international networks and catalysing global citizen engagement campaigns.
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