C-CAMP partners with UK Department of Health and Social Care’s Global AMR Innovation Fund to nurture and fund innovations for antimicrobial resistance in the environment
Up to £5.1 million funding has been committed over 3 years by the UK’s Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) to the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP) in India to foster the identification and development of world-class AMR-focused innovative solutions to tackle AMR in the environment. The project has a special focus on addressing challenges in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) with local, contextual solutions.
This partnership between GAMRIF and C-CAMP will support the development of innovative solutions addressing AMR in the environment, for the benefit of low- and middle- income countries where the burden of drug resistance is the highest.
Welcoming the announcement of this landmark cross-border partnership, Dr. Taslimarif Saiyed, Director-CEO, C-CAMP said: “C-CAMP is committed to fostering innovations addressing AMR across human, agriculture and environment. With our decade-long work in this area, we are confident of harnessing the most exciting AMR innovation science happening in India and across the globe into solutions to tackle the challenge, especially the often-neglected issue of environmental AMR that threatens low- and middle-income countries. The partnership with GAMRIF provides a 360-degree support across the whole value chain of solutions from idea identification to productisation, deployment and integration of innovation. This will be a gamechanger in the effort to nurture a global solutions pipeline, and not just entrepreneurial progress through funds disbursements. Looking forward to working with all national and international stakeholders with the guidance of the office of Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt. of India.”
Professor Dame Sally Davies, UK Special Envoy for AMR, said: “AMR impacts every human, animal and environment system, from local to global levels. The environment plays a key role in the emergence and spread of AMR and therefore forms a key part of the solution. I'm delighted that GAMRIF and C-CAMP are partnering to develop innovations combating this core element of the grand pandemic of AMR.”
Prof. Ajay K. Sood, Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt. of India, welcomed the partnership saying: “Antimicrobial resistance in the environment is a particularly serious issue even within the larger threat of AMR because of unchecked effluents from agriculture and industry reaching our water bodies, air and land. The GAMRIF C-CAMP collaboration will focus on tackling this problem through innovation, deployment of solutions and evidence-based policymaking, not only for India but also LMICs in geographies such as Africa where the AMR burden is the most alarming. C-CAMP is a torchbearer of AMR innovations from India and we are excited to see the result of this partnership for the global AMR innovation landscape.”
Prof. Vinod K. Paul, Member (Health), Niti Aayog, Govt. of India remarked that, “Antimicrobial Resistance is a complex inter-connected issue between human health, animal health and environment. This makes it especially difficult to create specific action points to mitigate AMR in environment. I am confident that this promising GAMRIF C-CAMP collaboration will bring tangible solutions to problems across the One Health domain through its focus on environment. We are at the cusp of the One Health Mission by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt of India. This GAMRIF C-CAMP initiative will connect and align well with its mandate. Also, in context of India NAP 2.0 that will take us to 2028, we have implemented a multisectoral strategy where sector-specific missions for 14 One Health organizations, ministries and departments are participating like the broad outlook of this important partnership.”
C-CAMP is India’s premier technology and innovation hub in the life sciences sector with the country’s largest portfolio of startups focusing on AMR. The partnership will identify and nurture state-of-the-art innovative solutions and technologies that address the escalating threat of the emergence, spread and transmission of AMR in the environment and its intersection with climate. The aim is to find solutions that are affordable, accessible and contextually relevant for India as well as other low- and middle-income countries where ecosystems are vastly different from most developed economies. Up to £5.1 million has been committed over the next 3 years, approximating around ₹500 million or ₹50Cr+. With this, C-CAMP joins GAMRIF’s funding portfolio of some of the world’s major AMR stakeholders, such as Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria Biopharmaceutical Accelerator (CARB-X), Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND), and Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership (GARDP).
The GRAM Report, published in the Lancet in 2019, estimates that 1.3 million people each year die due to AMR, with the highest mortality rates in low- and middle-income countries, primarily in Asia and Africa. By 2050, deaths associated with AMR are projected to rise to a staggering 10 million each year, surpassing the global death toll of malaria and comparable to that of cancer. The impacts of climate change, antimicrobial misuse and overuse across the food and agriculture industries and antimicrobial pollution in the environment will all contribute to this rise in AMR-related deaths. Despite the fact that LMICs bear a disproportionately higher global burden of AMR, the funding to foster innovative solutions best suited for the region has been acutely low.
The announcement of this partnership follows the publication of the UK’s second 5-year National Action Plan on AMR in May 2024. The UK’s AMR National Action Plan highlights that addressing AMR in the environment is essential to reducing preventable, unintentional exposure to antimicrobials and slowing the emergence of resistance. It embeds a one health approach to confronting AMR and commits to funding innovative scientific research, across sectors, which meets UK and global needs. India’s National Action Plan 2.0 on AMR is expected to be released soon. The Indian AMR Innovation Hub (IAIH), anchored by C-CAMP, is working under the guidance of the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt. of India, and the NITI Aayog, to fast-track innovative solutions to address AMR, in alignment with the National Action Plan on AMR. The partnership between GAMRIF and C-CAMP will work under the umbrella of the IAIH to leverage the collective mandate, and resources of nearly 40 national and international stakeholders and partners from the AMR ecosystem.
The GAMRIF C-CAMP partnership will kick off shortly with an AMR Challenge under the umbrella of IAIH that will invite applications from innovators and startups for funding and ecosystem support to enable scale up of technology, production, adoption and impact. The call for application is expected to open in August 2024.
About the Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF)
The Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) is a UK One Health aid fund that supports research and development around the world to reduce the threat of AMR in humans, animals and the environment for the benefit of people in LMICs. GAMRIF core objectives are to develop innovative One Health solutions to tackle AMR; increase availability of context-specific, accessible, and affordable innovations for LMICs; establish international research partnerships with industry, academia, and governments; and collaborate with and leverage additional funding from other global donors.
For further details please visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/the-global-amr-innovation-fund
About the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), Govt of UK
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) is the UK Government Department which is responsible for helping people to live more independent, healthier lives for longer. The Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) is a One Health UK aid fund that supports research and development around the world to reduce the threat of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in humans, animals and the environment for the benefit of people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). GAMRIF core objectives are to develop innovative One Health solutions to tackle AMR; increase availability of context-specific, accessible, and affordable innovations for LMICs; establish international research partnerships with industry, academia, and governments; and collaborate with and leverage additional funding from other global donors.
For further details, please visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-of-health-and-social-care