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Theme: One Health, one action: Prevent AMR now
World AMR Awareness Week is a global campaign to raise awareness and understanding of antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, and to promote action to tackle the emergence and spread of drug-resistant infections.
AMR occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites no longer respond to medicines intended to treat them, making infections harder, and sometimes impossible, to treat.
This year’s theme, “One Health, one action: Prevent AMR now,” reminds us that the health of people, animals, plants and the environment is closely connected. The medicines that save lives, the food we produce, the economies we depend on and the environment we share are all linked. When drug-resistant pathogens emerge and spread, they affect health, food security, economies and sustainable development.
WHO calls on governments, health workers, veterinarians, farmers, environmental practitioners, researchers, communities and individuals to take one action to prevent AMR now. Every action matters.
Campaign objectives
- Raise awareness and understanding of AMR as an urgent health, development, food systems and environmental challenge.
- Promote practical action to prevent infections, use antimicrobials responsibly, strengthen diagnosis, and protect life-saving medicines.
- Encourage countries and partners to work together through a One Health approach across human health, animal health, food systems, agriculture and the environment.
- Support Member States in translating AMR commitments into practical priorities for implementation of national action plans on AMR.
- Encourage individuals, institutions and sectors to make one concrete pledge or take one action against AMR.
Take one action against AMR
Everyone has a role to play in preventing AMR:
- Governments and policymakers can finance and implement national action plans on AMR, strengthen regulation, improve surveillance, and ensure equitable access to quality-assured antimicrobials, diagnostics and vaccines.
- Health workers can prevent infections, practice infection prevention and control, use diagnostic tests appropriately, prescribe and dispense antimicrobials responsibly, and review treatment when results become available.
- Veterinarians, farmers and food producers can use antimicrobials responsibly, strengthen biosecurity, improve animal health and welfare, and reduce the need for antimicrobials through good production practices.
- Environmental practitioners and partners can support safe waste and wastewater management, reduce pollution, and address environmental pathways that contribute to AMR.
- Communities and individuals can stay up to date with recommended vaccinations, practice hand hygiene, prepare food safely, use antimicrobials only on professional advice, never share or use leftover medicines, and dispose of unused medicines safely.
Together, through One Health and one action at a time, we can prevent and contain the spread of AMR, protect the health of people, animals, plants and the environment, strengthen food systems and support more resilient economies.
Spread the word: Campaign materials
People of the Western Pacific – Mildred, Philippines
People of the Western Pacific – Colin, Australia